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ROCKY
MOUNTAINS

Cornell XDlnivetstt^

IRew IPorft State CoUeoe of Hfiriculture

DEPARTMENT OF FORESTRY

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Cornell University Library
F 595.J67 1913

Pj B Cornell University
VB Library

The original of tliis book is in
tine Cornell University Library.

There are no known copyright restrictions in
the United States on the use of the text.

http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924014020519

HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS OF
THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS

INCLUDING

NORTH DAKOTA

SOUTH DAKOTA

NEW MEXICO

OKLAHOMA

COLORADO

NEBRASKA

MONTANA

WYOMING

KANSAS

TEXAS

UTAH

AND THE

YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK

Pike's Peak from the Garden of the Gods

HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS

OF THE

ROCKY MOUNTAINS

•rg>

=3^

WRITTEN AND

ILLUSTRATED BY

CLIFTON JOHNSON

Published by THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
Nezv York Mcmx

LONDON: MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED

Copyright, 1906 and IQIJ,
by the Macmillan Company.

New Edition Published
April, 1913.

AMERICAN
HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS

THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS

Ehclrotyped

and

Printed

by the

F. A. Bassette Company

Springjietd, Mass,

Contents

I.

When the Fields Turn Green in Nebraska

P.g.

I

II.

Historic Kansas .....

24

III.

In Oklahoma

42

IV.

A Texas Bubble .

62

V.

On the Banks of the Rio Grande

83

VI.

Pueblo Life in New Mexico .

100

VII.

Around Pike's Peak

120

VIII.

In the Heart of the Rockies .

140

IX.

Life in a Mormon Village

158

X.

XI.

Wyoming Days .

Mountain and Valley in Montana

177
194

XII.

May in the Yellowstone

215

XIII.

Custer's Last Battlefield

233

XIV.
XV.

Among the Black Hills .
A Dakota Paradise

250
264

vn

Illustrations

Pike's Peak viewed from the Garden of the Gods Frontispiece

Facing Page

Spring in a Home Field ....... 4

In the Pigpen ......... 9

A Cyclone Cellar ....... 16

Looking for Gophers . . . . . . .21

The First Cultivating . 26

A Pause in the Day's Work . . . . • 3'

Starting His Garden ........ 34

A Dooryard Well ........ 39

Talking Business ........ 42

An Indian House and the Tepee in the Yard ... 47

Evening by the Creekside ....... 50

On the Way to Town ...... 57

Some of the Tanks among the Derricks .... 64

Neighbor meets Neighbor ....... 69

A Hog Family 74

On the Hotel Piazza ........ 79

Filling a Cask 84

An Old Street 87

Housewives at their Washing ...... 92

In a Country Village ....... 98

The Enchanted Mesa ....... 103

The Ladders that Give Access to the Upper Stories . 106
The Governor of the Village . . . .111

ix

Illustrations

An Oven .....

The Old Church at Santa Fe

A Balanced Rock in the Garden of the Gods

Working on the Road

Cattle on a Cripple Creek Hilltop

Sorting over the Old Mine Dumps

The Farmer and His Helpmate .

Game in Sight ....

A Placer Miner in a Leadville Gulch

A Chat on the Highway

At the Backdoor of an Adobe House

On the Shore of the Great Salt Lake

Mormon Maidens

The Old Settler

Dove Cotes ....

A Tent Dweller

One of the Buttes Beside Green River

The Fisherman

In the Mining District of Butte .

A Pioneer Cabin

A Problem ....

A Rural Mail Delivery

A Terrace of Hot Springs .

An Upland Brook

A Geyser Basin

The Falls in the Canyon

Cavalry Maneuvers

The Spot where Custer Fell

An Indian Home on the Banks of the Little

A Waterside Footpath

A Dancer and a Youthful Admirer

Panning for Gold

lotn

Illustrations

XI

Begging to go Fishing

On a Black Hills Roadway

A Walk with Grandmother

Beside the Stream . . . .

The Village Cows Starting for Pasture

Advising the Boys . . . .

Dandelions

254
259
262
267
270

27s
278

'Tphis volume includes chapters on
characteristic, picturesque, and
historically attractive regions in the
states of Colorado, Nebraska, Kansas,
Texas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Utah,
Wyoming, Montana, South Dakota
and North Dakota, and a chapter on
the Yellowstone National Park.

The notes appended to each chap-
ter give valuable information con-
cerning automobile routes, and many
facts and suggestions of interest to
tourists in general.

Introductory Note

One of the preceding volumes in this series dealt
with the Mississippi Valley and another with the Pacific
Coast. The present book covers the region lying be-
tween and takes its name from the most dominant
physical feature of that area. Of necessity its text
deals both with the mountains and with the great agri-
cultural states that lie to the eastward, but perhaps
it is not any the less interesting because of the contrasts
thus afforded. I have tried to give a fair idea of the
varied characteristics and attractions of this vast
territory from Mexico to Canada.

The several volumes in this series have as a rule
very little to say of the large towns. Country life is
their chief topic, especially the typical and the pictur-
esque. To the traveller, no life is more interesting, and
yet there is none with which it is so difficult to get into
close and unconventional contact. Ordinarily, we
catch only casual glimpses. For this reason I have
wandered much on rural byways and lodged most of
the time at village hotels or in rustic homes. My trips

have taken me to many characteristic and famous
regions; but always in both text and pictures I have
tried to show actual life and nature and to convey some
of the pleasure I experienced in my intimate acquaint-
ance with the people.

These "Highways and Byways" volumes are often
consulted by persons who are planning pleasure tours.
To make the books more helpful for this purpose each
chapter has a note appended containing suggestions
for intending travellers. With the aid of these notes,
I think the reader can readily decide what regions are
likely to prove particularly worth visiting, and will
know how to see such regions with the most comfort
and facility.

Clifton Johnson.
Hadlby, Mass.

Highways and Byways of the
Rocky Mountains

I

WHEN THE FIELDS TURN GREEN IN NEBRASKA

THE winter was past, and the uncertain days
of early spring had aflForded enough encour-
agement to make the buds throw off their armor
of protecting scales and deck the boughs with tender
new leafage; and the sun in its northward journey
had coaxed the grass to thrust up many a valiant spear
through the last year's brown stubble. In the fields
the farmers were busy ploughing, or were making
preliminary preparations for it by getting rid of the
straw stacks, and the cornstalks, which were still stand-
ing, ragged and withered where they grew. The stalks
are cut with mowing-machines, gathered into wind-
rows with a horserake, and burned. The straw stacks
are burned also, and as you look out from the train
window at this season in the corn and wheat country
you see on every hand these little field fires with their
long trailings of smoke. When evening comes, the fires

2 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

are still burning, and the red flames impart an eerie
aspect to the dusky landscape.

I stopped at Grand Island in the Platte Valley, a
town that had recently celebrated its fiftieth birthday.
The region around is typical of the older Nebraska
farming country. One hundred and sixty acres is the
size of the usual farm, and the home buildings are
almost certain to be in a grove of protecting cotton-
woods that shut off the violence of the winds and are a
defence against the drifting snows.

There was something quite charming about the
grove environment of the homes. Through the trees
I could glimpse the snug little dwelling, the red barn,
the windmill, the numerous sheds and corn cribs, and
a medley of wagons and machines. I heard the domes-
tic cackle of hens, the crowing of roosters, the cooing
of doves, and there was perhaps a farmyard pool where
a bevy of ducks and geese were paddling. Then, too,
the groves are beloved by the birds. Those little busy-
bodies, the sparrows, are chirping about the premises
all the year through; and the robins, larks, yellow-
hammers and others arrive with the first mild days of
spring, so that I found the groves delightfully musical.

At one of the wayside homes where I stopped, the
woman of the house and several children were raking
up the cobs that strewed the hard-trodden farmyard,
and making bonfires of them. The cobs would have

When the Fields Turn Green in Nebraska 3

been good to burn in the stove, but they were broken,
and it was too much trouble to pick them up. They
are a standard fuel in the region, and are especially
esteemed for making a hot, quick fire in summer.
The family had a great bin-full stored for this purpose,
and they had sold many hundreds of bushels in the
town at two cents a bushel. In some homes cobs are
the only fuel, except that in winter a little green wood
is used with them to make the fire burn more steadily.

I stayed to dinner with my farmyard acquaintances.
They were prosperous and lived well, though more
heartily than delicately. We dined in two detach-
ments, the men and boys first, and then the feminine
portion of the household. This was a rather necessary
arrangement, for the rooms were small and there were
thirteen children, all of them at home. Excepting the
very youngest, every member of the family was a worker,
and the stooping shoulders of some of the lads seemed
to indicate that they had done too heavy tasks for their
age in years past. This is a not uncommon phase of
Western farm life. The children are sacrificed to the
crops.

On the sunny side of the house I counted eight cats
dozing in lazy comfort. They were, however, useful
members of the household; for without them the rats
and mice would raise havoc in the stores of grain.
The boys kept two or three dogs, partly for compan-

4 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

ionship, and partly to wage war on the gophers and
rabbits. "Those gophers are a mean animal around
this country," said one of the youths — "that's what
they are. They scratch after the corn just when it
begins to come up, and eat it. Sometimes we kill 'em
by drowning 'em out. We drowned out one last Sun-
day. The way we do it is to take a dog along, and he
smells around and digs, and then you know a gopher
is in that hole, sure thing. The dog won't get excited
on any old scent. We pour in water — perhaps two or
three buckets full — and pretty soon the gopher pokes
his nose out and starts off. But he's all wet and can't
run very fast, and we either kill him with a stick, or
the dog catches him. Sometimes the dogs go hunting a
gopher alone, and they'll get him, too — ^you bet they
will, even if they have to dig a hole three or four feet
deep.

"The rabbits ain't so bad as the gophers though they
do considerable damage gnawing the bark of young
fruit trees. We kill 'em as much as we can. But they
raise about three bunches of little ones in a season,
nine to a bunch, and we can't get 'em all."

The boy's father had taken up the land on which
he lived thirty-seven years ago. The second year after
he came, in the middle of April, occurred the worst
storm in the history of the state. " It caught us un-
prepared," he said; "for spring had come and we'd

Mi.

CO

When the Fields Turn Green in Nebraska 5

been having nice warm weather. I was at a neighbor's
when it started, and the first I knew there come a wind
that blew my hat off. Then I hurried home and got
the cattle to the sheds. But lots of people left 'em on
the prairie thinkin' the storm would soon be over.
The northwest wind was awful, and the cattle drifted
along before it. There was no fences then to stop 'em,
and they went into the Platte River and was drowned.

"The storm lasted three days. It was snow and rain
and everything mixed together so thick you couldn't
see. Some of the drifts were six or seven feet deep,
and our sheds were just blown full, but I made out to
get to the yard where the cattle were and fed 'em a
little corn. When the storm was over, most of 'em was
buried out of sight, except they'd kept their heads
moving so there was a little place where they could
breathe. Nearly all of 'em was lyin' down, and we
had to go to work and dig 'em out. A great many
birds were killed, and we found several wild ducks and
a deer dead. The drifts didn't all melt until June.

"Another bad storm was in January, 1888. We'd
been shelling corn that morning with the horsepower
in the yard, and while we was at dinner a big wind
began to blow and everything got dark. We had to
light the lamps. I could hardly stand against the
gale to get to the barn to see to the stock. A good
many roofs of cow sheds and outbuildings were just

6 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

straw or hay thrown on, and the wind blew that right
ofF.

"At our schoolhouse the teacher and the twenty or
more children stayed all night. They had a fire and
there was lamps that they lit, but they got pretty hun-
gry before the next day. Some teachers didn't have
the sense to keep the children, and quite a number of
little boys and girls was frozen to death trying to get
home."

When I left the farmhouse I contmued my rambling
across the low levels until I came to the Platte, a wide
and rather uncanny looking stream, the bed of which
showed decidedly more sandbars than water. Indeed,
it is sometimes spoken of as a mile wide and an inch
deep. But in June when it is swollen by melting snows
from the distant mountains it is a wild and swift,
though still shallow torrent. Gradually the waters
recede until September, when the flow entirely ceases
and there is nothing left but sand and stagnant pools.
It is a treacherous stream to ford, even when the water
is nearly at its lowest, and a local farmer related
how he was once crossing on foot and came to a place
only ankle deep, yet he sank in quicksand above his
knees and had a hard struggle to get out.

I did not care to linger long on the river bank, for
a rude and chilling wind blew that was quite uncom-
fortable. I wondered that the birds could sing so

When the Fields Turn Green in Nebraska 7

blithely, and was in doubt whether it was from enjoy-
ment or to keep up their courage in the boisterous
weather.

The pioneer who led the first band of settlers to the
region was still living in the vicinity, and one evening
I called on him. His house was on the far side of a
thirty-five acre grove, and the approach to it was by a
winding road through the great trees. The dusk was
deepening, and the lamp was lighted in the kitchen where
the family was just finishing supper when I rapped.
The old settler himself came to the door. "Why
don't you come in ?" he said, as if rapping was a needless
ceremony.

He was a vigorous, elderly German, whose kindly
hospitality at once put me at rhy ease and we were soon
chatting about his early experiences.

" It looks like a crazy piece of work, my coming here
to live," said he. "In my boyhood there was nothing
to indicate that I was cut out for a frontiersman; but
some inward power causes young people to go, go, go.
At first, when I came to America, I settled in Iowa,
and at the time of the financial panic in 1857 my brother-
in-law and I were in the mercantile business there and
failed. We were ten thousand dollars in debt, and it
was 'Root hog, or die.' But look at this," and he took
a tiny green bottle from a drawer. " There is the proud-
est piece of property I've got. In that bottle are the

8 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

ashes of the notes I gave for my debts; and I made
all the money to pay those notes right here in this
wilderness.

"Some men around where I lived in Iowa were
interested in starting a town just half way between
the east and west coasts. They thought that would be
the place for the national capital. A number of con-
gressmen were interested, too, and they were far-
sighted enough to see that a railroad was bound to go
up the Platte Valley, because that furnished the best
natural grade for a route across the continent. They
wanted their town in this valley, and they asked me
to organize a colony. They were to furnish a surveying
party and all the grub and arms and ammunition, and
were to have half the land we took up. Our party
started in June, 1858. There were thirty-seven of us
including several women and children. The only
settlement this side of Omaha was sixty miles east of
here. To the west was nothing but a few forts.

"The exact central spot is twelve miles farther up
the river, but it was a dry year and the land there was
rather high and had become so parched it didn't look
as if it was good for anything. In fact, the country
everywhere, except along the streams, was apparently
a sort of desert where it seemed as if no one would
ever be fool enough to settle. Besides, even if the land
had been all right, a person couldn't in those days

In the pigfen

When the Fields Turn Green in Nebraska 9

have a home far from the streams, because on the open
prairies there was no wood to burn or to build with;
and no water unless deep wells were bored, and we
had no machinery for doing that. But here it was all
green and nice with quite a little timber along the river,
and we decided on this for our location.

"The first thing we did was to cut cottonwoods and
build four log cabins. They each had two rooms with
a roofed passage between and were in a group close
together. We had no boards, and our early roofs were
either of sods or of slue grass. This slue grass grew
as tall as a man, and when cut early enough it made
good fodder — fine! It made excellent roofsj too.
We'd bind it on with willow withes, and, if well made,
such a roof would last a lifetime. As soon as the houses
were done we began to break up the prairie, and some
sowed buckwheat and got a crop that season. Plenty
of prairie grass grew in the vicinity, and it was knee-
high and as thick as could be. With our scythes we
mowed enough to feed our animals through the winter.
The next spring I built a log house specially for myself,
and it is the ell of my present house. You are in one of
its rooms now. For a while this was rather a lonesome
country, but in 1859 Pike's Peak was discovered —
that is, gold was found in the Rocky Mountains.
People got wild, and train after train of fortune seekers
passed up the trail, often fifty wagons in a train, and
they kept going till the railroad was built in 1866.

10 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

"The second year after I came I wrote to my credit-
ors, 'If you expect me to settle my debts you must send
me a mowing-machine, and you must pay the freight
to Omaha.'

"They sent it, and I made eight hundred and twelve
dollars with it the same season. Twelve dollars I kept
to buy things that were needed at home, and the rest
I sent to my creditors. The country was getting more
people in it all the time, and by and by I wrote to my
creditors, ' If you expect me to settle my debts you must
send me a threshing-machine, and pay the freight to
Omaha.'

"You see I forwarded to them all the money I made,
and so I couldn't pay for the machine or the freight
either. It cost nearly seven hundred dollars, but they
sent it, and I made two thousand dollars with it that
year to lessen my debt.

"In the winters I trapped beaver, otter and mink,
and poisoned wolves. Beaver were plenty then, and
so were the other creatures. I've killed seventy-five
wolves in a single season. Most of 'em I got right
around my house with poison. I stumbled onto a very
good way to make sure of 'em. I'd prepare a number
of sticks about fifteen inches long, pointed at both ends,
and I'd cut some meat into inch cubics, one for the tip
of each stick, and right where the point of the stick
come through the meat I put some strychnine in a pellet

When the Fields Turn Green in Nebraska 1 1

of lard. Next I'd drag a big chunk of buffalo meat
along the ground to make a trail for the wolves to scent,
and at intervals on the trail I'd set up my sticks. So
now I was ready for business. In the night the wolves
would come and dash along taking the pieces of meat,
one after another. The lard would melt right away so
the strychnine would take immediate effect and they
wouldn't go far. Often I'd find 'em within fifty steps.
Most settlers would put the poison into the meat and
leave the meat on the ground. It would kill the wolves,
but not quickly, and they'd die too far away to be found.
Then there was no chance to get the hides. I sold the
coyote skins for about a dollar, but the big gray timber
wolves brought twice or three times as much. This
little house has been nailed all over outside with wolf,
beaver and other skins, and the walls inside hung full
of the cured hides.

" My clothing was of buckskin, Indian-tanned, and
it was warm in winter and cool in summer. Buffalo
robes were our bedding for many years. The Indians
would sell us the best of buffalo skins for two or three
dollars apiece. I have seen thousands and thousands of
buffalo at one time. You could look around and
there'd be large herds on every side. The prairie was
black with 'em. I thought we'd have the finest hunting
as long as I lived, and my children after me. But pretty
soon men began to butcher the buffaloes for their hides.

12 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

and lots of 'em were killed by the emigrants who'd
shoot 'em with their good-for-nothing rifles, and often
only cripple 'em. Sometimes the wounded buffalo
would drag itself away twenty miles before it died.
So in ten or twelve years all of 'em were gone, and most
of the other game as well.

"October was our hunting time. We'd fix up a
couple of wagons, and I'd drive with one companion to
the Loop River to stay a month or so. We didn't know
whether buffalo would be plenty or not, and as soon as
we had a chance we'd kill any that we could, even if
they were old fellows. The meat might be tough, but
it was all good. Later, if we could get younger animals
we'd throw the tough meat away. We didn't save the
hides. They were too heavy to carry. The scent of the
buffaloes we killed would be carried a long distance,
and it attracted the wolves. At night we'd have to chain
our horses well to the wagons or they'd break away.
Hundreds of wolves would gather around, and I tell
you their howling was a peculiar music. It was enough
to make a greeny's hair stand on end. First one would
howl and then the whole lot on all sides.

"Every winter the Pawnees camped down here on
the river, and this house has been full of Indians many
a time. In stormy weather they'd come in here and
stay all day and tell me everything they knew. Occa-
sionally two or three would stop over night. My wife

When the Fields Turn Green in Nebraska 13

and I would be in our bed at the other side of the room,
and they'd lie around the stove in the corner.

"When we came here we were at peace with all the
Indians around; but I got the company together one
time and said: 'Now, boys, these wild neighbors of ours
are certain to give us trouble sooner or later, and I
would advise that we build a strong fortification to pro-
tect our families.'

"Then one of the fellows says: 'He wants us to
furnish him with a cow stable.'

"'That's enough,' I said; 'I'll build the fortification
myself.'

" So I went to work and made a stout log cabin with
twenty-five portholes in it and a heavy four-inch door.
Well, late in the summer of 1864 there was an Indian
uprising. Everybody was frightened and for twenty
miles around you could see the dust rising, stirred up by
the fleeing people with their teams and cattle and dogs
and cats and all they had. That fellow who'd accused
me of wanting my neighbors to put up a building that
would serve me for a cow stable came to me and said:
What are you going to do i'

"'I'm too big a coward to run,' I says. 'So I'mgoin'
to stay right here.'

"Then he wanted to take advantage of my block-
house, but I said: 'You're the last man I want in that
fort. It's too good for you, and you can't stay.'

14 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

"The other people who lived near helped pile sods
outside around the base, and we had a well in a corner,
and an underground annex where we kept our horses.
Thirty-five persons stayed in the fort for three weeks.
A good many scattered settlers were killed, but the In-
dians didn't attack us."

My companion paused meditatively a few moments
and then said: "If it was daytime I'd like to show you
my apiary. I got my first bees twenty-seven years ago,
and I spent a good deal of time and money to make good
quarters for them. My wife did not like what I was doing
and she got mad. 'This is not a country of flowers,' she
said, 'and we shall never have a bit of honey on the table.'

"She kept talking and talking, and at last I says:
' Mama, you keep to your business in the kitchen, and
I'll take care of things outdoors.'

" Night and day I studied about bees till I learned to
take scientific care of them. By and by I had honey to
sell, and I increased the number of hives to about forty.
Those bees have made for me eight thousand dollars,
and so now my wife likes the bees, too. She is some-
times a little bit after the dollar herself.

" The apiary is in a little open space at the edge of my
grove and near by I have an ornamental garden with
flowers and vines and arbors. The grove is open to the
public, and people come to it much to drive or walk
through. Lovers like to ramble and loiter along its

When the Fields Turn Green in Nebraska 15

paths and roadways on Sunday afternoons, and many a
match has been made there. I set out the first trees
that were ever set out in this part of the country. They
were twelve cottonwoods, and I said: 'There are the
twelve apostles. May they teach forestry in all this
region.'

"Those original trees are all gone now. Most of
them died of old age, but one was destroyed by light-
ning, and I called that ' Judas Iscariot.'

" Many things have changed since I came here. Even
the air is different. It used to be purer and less humid,
and we'd often see a mirage. While I was still living in
Iowa a fellow from our town made a journey to Cali-
fornia, and when he came back he of course had a good
deal to tell. 'It's hard to believe,' says he; 'but I have
seen a buffalo, and when I crawled two miles to get to
it, by jingo! it was a crow.'

"'Heavens! what a liar that fellow is!' I said to my-
self. 'He's been to a bad school in California.' But
when I came here the air played the same tricks on me.

" The worst setback this state ever had was the grass-
hopper plague in 1875. The insects came in such num-
bers they hid the sun. I had six acres of corn — fine
corn. It was August and the ears had formed, but were
still soft. In half an hour after the grasshoppers ar-
rived nothing was left except the stalks. A neighbor
had a nice field of onions. The grasshoppers began to

1 6 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

come about noon one day and he said, 'We'll all go out
and save what we can of those onions.'

"But his wife said: 'The dumplings are hot. Eat
dinner first.'

"So the family sat down and ate, and wnen they went
out to rescue the onions the grasshoppers had eaten, too,
and there were no onions to rescue.

"The grasshoppers were bad enough in their way,
but, still more disturbing to my peace of mind was a
neighbor I used to have. His name was Hefner, and he
lived just across the highway from my grove. No one
could be more cussed and mean and sneaking. If
there's a hell that's where he is now. My brother-in-law
had some land near Hefner's place that he was breaking
up one fall, and he used to feed his oxen early in the
morning sb't they'd be ready to work later, and then
he'd go back to bed. That was his way of doing things.
He was a good man, but lazy. While he was having his
nap Hefner would come out and set his dog on the oxen,
and away they'd go over the prairie. So when my
brother-in-law got ready to plough he'd have a long
walk to get 'em. This happened day after day until he
had some suspicion of what was going on, and my wife
did, too; but they knew what a firebrand I was, and
didn't tell me. I would have stopped it just that quick !"
and he snapped his fingers.

" Finally my brother-in-law lay in the long grass and
saw Hefner set his dog on the oxen, and he went to him

When the Fields Turn Green in Nebraska 17

and told him he'd got to quit that sort of thing. Well,
there were some other differences between us and Hef-
ner, and he began circulating stories about us. One
Sunday afternoon we were having coffee, German
fashion, when a team with six men in it drove up to the
house. I went out and invited 'em in to have coffee
with us, but they said they just come to speak to me and
my brother-in-law. 'We want to tell you,' said they,
'that unless you two stop troubling Mr. Hefner your
days are numbered.'

"'You rascals, you villains!' I shouted, 'if you will
wait one minute your days are numbered now!'

"I ran in after my rifle, but when I came out they
were lashing their horse to get away. Even then I
would have had a shot at them, if my people had not
held my wrists.

"I spoke about Hefner's dog and the oxen. That
dog was a constant nuisance, and yet he would have
been all right if he had had a good master, but Hefner
was too stingy to feed him, and he was savage and half
starved. One night I heard a noise and I went out with
my gun to see what was the matter. Hefner's dog had
jumped up and got a quarter of antelope I had hung on
the side of the house about nine feet from the ground.
He was gnawing it, and when I opened the door he
began to drag the meat away. 'Gr-r-r!' he said.

"I took aim with my gun — bum! and there he was.
Then I went to bed and slept well, and the next morning

1 8 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

early I dragged the dog over to Hefner's and rapped on
his window. * Mr. Hefner,' I said, 'here is your dog, and
I give you notice that any thief who comes onto my
premises, whether he has two legs or four, will meet the
same treatment.'

"Well, well, that's all past now. How time does
jump along. My youngest boy was telling me yesterday
he was forty years old, but I don't believe it; and yet
he may be right and the years have slipped away faster
than I could realize."

The old settler's sincerity and courage, and his bel-
ligerant attitude toward what was mean and under-
handed were very attractive, and I enjoyed him and his
lively description of his experiences so thoroughly that
I stayed until late into the night and parted from him
with regret.

When I left the Grand Island region I went to the
southern borders of the state. Here was the same pros-
perity, but the country was somewhat newer than that
along the Platte, and the houses were not so sheltered
by trees. Alfalfa is one of the important crops, and as
the fields are mowed three or four times, haying is al-
most continuous from early June till the middle of Octo-
ber. But the Nebraska farmers do not make as hard
work of haying as the Eastern agriculturists do, and
the task is largely accomplished with machinery.

Wealth is the rule rather than the exception, and
farmers worth twenty thousand dollars or over are not

When the Fields Turn Green in Nebraska 19

at all unusual. But evidence of this is seldom seen in
the style in which they live. You find it instead in the
big fertile fields. The owners may continue to inhabit
a cramped and shabby dwelling, wear work-a-day gar-
ments to town, and drive around in a ramshackle car-
riage, or in a lumber wagon with an extra spring seat
put in for the wife or other members of the family to sit
on when they go too. It is not alone in the country
that the dwellings are small, for diminutive houses are
surprisingly plentiful in all the villages. These are,
however, a matter of preference. " My house is only a
one-story cottage," said a merchant with whom I talked
on the subject; "but it's all my wife can take care of.
There's a doctor lives next door to me who has such a
big house that he has to keep a hired girl; and his wife
and that girl are busy all the time. No sooner do they
get the house hoed out once than they have to begin and
hoe it out again."

Not all the farmers own the land they till. Some are
"renters." As one such man explained the situation,
the owner of his place " kept the buildings in repair, or
was supposed to," and paid the taxes and received for
rental a third of the crop, delivered in market. If the
season was favorable both parties did well, but he told
of one dry year when he had fifty-five acres of corn,
"and there wasn't an ear fit to feed the horses," said he.
" I snapped ofi^ some for the cows and I saved the fodder,
but it was poor stuff."

20 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

The man was going to drive to town, and I rode with
him. It was Saturday afternoon, which has a good deal
the character of a half-holiday among the farm folk.
Going to town is their chief recreation, and the place
was enlivened with many teams, and the stores were
busy with people bargaining and buying. It is the
women of the household who do the bulk of the trading,
and the man sits down on a sidewalk drygoods box and
waits for someone to come along to talk to him.

On this particular day there was quite a buzz over an
incident of the previous evening. It seemed that about
two years previous a middle-aged Missourian came to the
village, whose methods of supporting himself were open
to question. He boarded at the hotel, and though he
did an occasional honest day's work, it was as a gambler
that he made a living. Playing poker for money was
not uncommon among the natives, but he was more
expert with the cards than they and was the winner in
the games they played with him to a very dispropor-
tionate degree. Soon after his advent there began to be
a series of robberies from the stores. Suspicion fell on
the Missourian. There was no evidence as to who was
guilty, but the authorities felt they must make an ex-
ample of somebody and they got him before the court
for gambling. He was found guilty and sent to jail. In
his testimony, however, he implicated so many of the
townspeople that when he returned to his adopted vil-
lage his welcome was far from cordial. He had arrived

Looking for gophers

When the Fields Turn Green in Nebraska 21

the day before, and a crowd got together in the evening
and told him he must leave town at once. He was de-
fiant, but after some squabbling they got him to the
railway station. There he broke away and ran across
the tracks up the opposite bank. The mob called on
him to halt, and he drew a revolver and faced them.
But though they knew he was a desperado they were too
angry and excited to be stopped and promptly closed on
him, wrested away the revolver, and a little later put
him on a train that bore him off in the direction of his
native state.

Incidents of this sort were of course exceptional, and
life as a whole in the region was decidedly placid. Oc-
casionally the town would make a grand effort and have
a fair. Street booths were erected wherein the mer-
chants made novel displays of their wares; acrobats
were hired to give performances free to the public; and
there were processions of decorated wagons in which
rode the pretty girls of the community, and men in
fancy costumes led the horses. The young and the
frisky of the crowd bought confetti and threw it at each
other, and some of them would go so far as to chuck it
into the faces of the preachers. These fairs were in-
tended to advertise and boom the town.

A celebration of a quieter sort was a Sunday-school
picnic in a grove beside the sluggish creek that wandered
through the lowlands. Then, too, there were the church
sociables where cake and ice cream were dispensed.

22 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

The profits helped pay the minister, and many people
would go to the sociables who rarely attended church.

In the winter there was sure to be a variety of public
entertainments by both local talent and travelling pro-
fessionals. Once a lecture course was attempted, but
it was not very successful. The people preferred to be
amused rather than instructed. They, however, seemed
to find a peculiar fascination in a rivival. Even if a
person was not personally drawn into the whirlpool of
religious emotion, the freakish displays of human na-
ture that developed were interesting to contemplate.
One recent evangelist had inveighed strenuously against
the use of tobacco. Bill Tripp, an inveterate back-
slider, whose habit it was to get converted in every fresh
revival, rose in the midst of this exhortation, went to the
stove, opened the door, and threw in a plug of the weed
that he took from his pocket. Then he slammed the
stove door ostentatiously and returned to his seat. The
heroism and self-sacrifice of this act were appreciated,
and many another fellow in the audience went and did
likewise. Their reformation rejoiced the preacher, but
he did not know that most of them bought a fresh supply
of tobacco the next day. The use of tobacco was gen-
eral in the region, and the boys began to smoke quite
young. Yet they did not indulge in cigarets. These
cannot lawfully be sold in Nebraska, and the result is a
feeling that cigarets are rather disreputable anyway.

On my final evening in this vicinity I went for a walk
out along the country roads and saw the sun go down

When the Fields Turn Green in Nebraska 23

beyond the edge of the vast level sweep of the horizon.
The birds were singing their last songs, the rabbits were
nibbling along the roadsides, the hens were fluttering
to roost in the farmyard trees. As I looked about in the
cool damp of the dusk the fertile prosperity of the region
impressed me more than ever. How beautiful and full
of promise it all was ! and what I could see was typical
of most of the great state.

Note. — "Wherever you can raise wheat, alfalfa, and corn, you've got the
world beat easy,'' one Nebraska man said to me. That superlative condi-
tion is characteristic of a considerable portion of the state, and the agricul-
tural prosperity of the commonwealth is a chief reason for the traveller's
making its acquaintance. There is perhaps no one region that excels all
others. Much the same scenes and the same charms exist in many sections,
and likewise in the three neighboring states of Iowa, Missouri, and Kansas,
which with Nebraska constitute "the big four" from the farm point of view.

Up to 1854 Nebraska had no civilized inhabitants except soldiers sent to
keep the Indian tribes in order, and the missionaries and fur-traders, nor did
the population increase rapidly until after the Union Pacific Railroad was
begun, two years later.

Omaha, the largest city in the state, is one of the important gateways
to the far West, and so is appropriately called the Gate City. At South
Omaha, 4 miles distant, are great stockyards and packing-houses. Just
north of the city is Fort Omaha, the chief signal service, balloon, and wire-
less experiment station of the United States Army. The automobile route
to the west goes up the Platte Valley following the historic "Overland
Route" or "Oregon Trail," which was travelled by the early fur-traders,
the migrating Mormons, and great numbers of the gold-seeking Forty-niners.
The pioneers crossed the Missouri by ferry from Council Bluffs on the east
bank to Omaha on the west bank. Beyond Columbus, eighty-four miles
from Omaha, is a perfectly straight stretch of railroad track for forty miles.
The highway from Omaha to Grand Island, one hundred and fifty miles, is
sandy in spots, but on the whole excellent. Grand Island has the largest
horse market west of Chicago.

II

HISTORIC KANSAS

IT was only a little while ago that we thought of
Kansas as a half-parched prairie country where the
promise of an occasional good year lured the set-
tlers to their certain undoing later, and where mort-
gages, hopelessly beyond the power of the farmers to
pay, were well-nigh universal. This opinion, though
never altogether fair to the state, was not without con-
siderable foundation. But now the aspect is decidedly
different. Good season follows good season, the mort-
gages have melted away, and Kansas has become one of
the wealthiest and most productive agricultural states
in the Union.

The region with which I became best acquainted is
that about Lawrence on the Kansas River. Lawrence
attracted me because of its New England ancestry and
its troubled history in the anti-slavery struggle. The
town itself might almost be a bit of Massachusetts, for
Massachusetts people have moulded it and are still pre-
dominant in its life; and the tidy comfort and generous
size of the homes, the tree-shadowed streets and trim
lawns, and the repose and air of refinement that have
come with the passing years are quite delightful.

Historic Kansas 25

When I wandered out into the country I found that
similarly pleasing, and the homes were as a rule, com-
modious and shadowed by fine oaks and maples. Re-
cent timely rains had given the soil a thorough soaking,
the wheat and alfalfa and grass were all growing bravely,
the potatoes were thrusting up into view, and the gardens
were beginning to yield the earliest of their table
delicacies.

Everywhere I saw workers in the fields toiling back
and forth with their ploughs and harrows and planting-
machines. It was a busy time, and yet I always found
the workers ready to stop and chat with me. They were
vigorous, capable fellows for the most part, who were
satisfied with their condition and even enthusiastic over
it; for they were prospering and the future looked
bright with promise. As one native remarked : " There's
money in farming here, and good money, too. These
panics we hear about don't worry us any. They are
Eastern affairs caused by the financial bullies of New
York. Prices have been awful big for farm crops and
we're all right. This ten-acre potato field I'm at work
in I've rented from a man who lives in town, and I'll
tell you the God's truth — the first year I raised potatoes
on this ground I made a hundred dollars an acre. But
the next year potatoes were a drug on the market, and
lots of 'em never was dug. I sold three hundred bushels
at eight cents a bushel. I usually dig about the middle
of June, and then put the land into rye. That grows

26 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

big enough so I can let the farm creatures run in it all
winter. Last winter I turned into this field fifteen hogs,
five head of cattle and two or three horses. It didn't
cost me hardly a dollar for any other feed, and the
animals come through just as fat as could be. If I
didn't sow the land to some crop, after the potatoes were
out, the crab grass would sprout up in a few weeks as
thick as the hair on a dog's back, and don't you forget it!

" I used to have a grocery in the village near the river,
but that flood in 1903 swept everything away as clean
as a whistle. I never thought of its coming up to where
my store was, and I didn't attempt to move out any
goods. Yes, it took the building and left a hole four-
teen feet deep. That was fierce. At my house matters
wa'n't much better. The water was up in the second
story, and when it went down the plastering come off
and the furniture fell to pieces. I'd bought a new sur-
rey and a single buggy a little while before and the
flood took those. Oh, it just naturally destroyed all I
had. But now I'm through with the grocery business,
and I wouldn't go back to it. In a store you're every-
body's lackey. This is a much more independent life,
and it pays better, too. Yes, sir, farming is good enough
for me."

I repeated the ex-groceryman's remarks to another
local farmer. "I'll tell you right now," said he, "that
you couldn't run fast enough to give me the best grocery
store in Lawrence. I used to be a bookkeeper in a

Historic Kansas 27

railroad office and had to leave because of poor health,
but I wouldn't take my old job again under any circum-
stances. Besides, I've got my children to think of, and
the town's no place for them.

" I make a specialty of vegetables, and it's been in-
teresting learning how to handle 'em just right. I
haven't got it all learned yet, and wouldn't if I lived to
be two or three hundred years old. But there's no one
around here doing any better with garden truck than I
am. When we have a fair in town I take the largest
space and make the finest show. I got a hundred and
sixty-two dollars last year in premiums, and a seed man
gave me twenty-five dollars for the privilege of hanging
a sign over my display saying that the things was raised
from his firm's seed. They weren't, but 'twas a good
advertisement for him.

"The year of the flood I lost four acres of stuff and
thought myself lucky to lose no more. Most of the land
around lay lower than mine, and a good many of the
neighbors had their entire crops ruined. The flood
come about the first of June, and we'd never known
anything like it. The Indians told of a similar flood in
1844, but the whites had lived here fifty years and seen
nothing of the sort, so we didn't believe the Indians
told the truth. When I saw the water spreading all over
everywhere I drove my stock to the hills and took my
family along. But we was soon back, and everything
I raised sold for big prices the season through.

28 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

"That flood didn't begin to be as serious to me as a
hailstorm we had early in the summer two years ago.
Three men I'd hired by the day had been helping me,
and we'd just got the garden cleaned up of weeds. It
was six o'clock and time to quit and they was starting
for home. But I said: 'The clouds look pretty black
and we're goin ' to have a bad storm. You better come
in my cave a little while with me and my family.'

"So we all went to the cave and stayed till the storm
was over. It destroyed every crop I had, and farther
up the valley it was a real cyclone that took the bark off
the hedges and blowed the buildings to smithereens.
One man there was laughed at by his family for bein'
afraid, because he wanted 'em to go to their cave when
the storm was approaching. He went alone, and he never
saw any of the others alive. The storm took the whole
outfit. The cyclones do some funny things. I knew of
a baby that was carried half a mile and dropped in a
graveyard without bein ' hurt a bit. Another queer case
was that of a fellow who was landed in the top of a tree
with his leg broken. He lived, but he was never good
for much afterward. There's a story, too, of a family
that had started to run from the back door to their cave
when a cyclone picked 'em up and whirled 'em off for
nine or ten miles. They didn't happen to hit any steeples
or trees or buildings, and pretty soon were dropped
down right where they'd started from, out of breath,
but all safe and sound. The minister heard of their

Historic Kansas 29

escape and come and congratulated 'em, and he ended
up by shaking hands with the man and saying: 'Brother,
the Lord was with you.'

"'Well, if He was,' the man replies, 'all I can say is
that He was a-goin' some.'

"Most everyone on the bottoms has a cyclone cellar.
It ain't such a necessity on the uplands; for the air up
there don't get heated as it does here and is much less
apt to start swirling. Our cyclones are electrical storms
with lots of thunder and lightning, and the noise and
the flashes are so near when the storm passes over that
it seems like as not you'd get hit. I've always took my
family to the cave when I thought there was any danger;
and if I'm in town and the weather looks threatening
I'll telephone out and caution 'em to keep watch and go
to the cave in time."

The man showed me the vegetables he was raising
on his land, and the hotbeds where he had started
sprouts for three acres of sweet potatoes. "And now,"
said he, when the tour was completed, "come into the
house and hear a tune on my graphophone."

So he ushered me into his tiny parlor where I sat and
listened to the music. When this entertainment was
concluded, he resumed work and I betook myself to the
highway. Just down the road was a "traveller's"
family sitting at the foot of a great Cottonwood tree eat-
ing dinner, and close by was their canvas-covered
wagon. Two mules and a horse were hitched to the

30 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

wheels and they were munching a feed of corn, or nib-
bling the grass. I stopped to have a talk with this
nomad household, and the man said : " I been in Okla-
homa for six years where I had a quarter section of
government land. We're goin' back now to where I
used to live in Missouri."

"Travelling like this ain't very pleasant," remarked
the woman. " It's too dirty for me."

"Yes, and the children get uneasy and go to fighting,"
the man added. " Some days are pretty hard on all of
us. We can get up and start of a morning, and if the
roads are good go forty mile easy. But yesterday the
roads was bad, and it was hot, so my team was tireder
after thirty mile than they'd been any day before.
There are regions where travellers can't always get
water, but we don't have any trouble thataway around
here. Sometimes when we are ready to stop toward
evening we'll run onto a man who ain't got no hay, and
we'll have to drive a little longer'n we really like to in
order to buy feed. We stop most anywhere that night
finds us, right side of the road, and tie the mules and
horse to the wheels. They do jam around a good deal,
but we've got used to that. We sleep in the wagon.
The boys have a place under the seat, and the rest of us
settle down in the back part."

The farmers of the region did not have much liking
for the travellers. "They are just that class of people
who want to live without work," one man informed me.

A pause in the day's work

Historic Kansas 31

"Of course, some of 'em are all right; but a good many
just start out in the fall and live on the country. They
pick lots of corn along the roadsides to feed their horses,
and never buy nothin' if they can help it. Everything
is convenient for 'em, and they'll take potatoes and
cabbages and fruit and once in a while pick up a chicken.
This is a main travelled road, and I've seen the same
wagon go west one week and east the next, and you
find some of 'em goin' the year around. There'll be a
man and wife and three or four little children, and
they'll send the young ones in to the houses beggin'.
The children'll tell you their father's sick and the like
o ' that, and yet the father may be a big stout man with
nothin' the matter of him but laziness. Oh, I know
that to be a fact. There was once some of those children
got a basket of potatoes and things of my wife, tellin '
her their father wa'n't able to work; but I'd seen the
family by the roadside, and he would weigh two hun-
dred pounds and was takin ' care of the horses. He was
abler to work than I am. I made up my mind that the
next time such a story was told I'd go out to the wagon
and see if the old man really was sick. I've never
knowed of any of 'em stoppin' to work. They could
get a job if they wanted it. No one need holler for work
in this country. Offer it to 'em, even at the top price,
and them fellers'll claim they ain't able to work. They
mostly disappear in the winter, and I reckon they go
south like the ducks and geese to where it's warm.

32 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

" Do you see all these loads of hay goin ' to town on
this road ? It's prairie hay. There's lots of that wild
hay cut — oh, land, yes ! Probably twenty or thirty tons
pass here every day. We raise good hay, both the wild
and what is grown on the cultivated fields; but we
ought not to store so much of it in stacks. Barn hay
always brings a better price, and there's more money
lost in Kansas every year by having hay spoiled or hurt
in the stacks than we would need to spend to build
barns to shelter it. We've had good seasons ever since
1 90 1, but that year the weather was so dry at harvest
time she pretty near burnt us out — you bet she did! I
was fighting fires in the wheat fields for seven days and
five nights. The fires would start from the railroad
engines. So, to prevent further trouble, the railroads
hired teams to turn a furrow one hundred and fifty feet
from the rails on each side, and burnt off all between
the two furrows for a fire guard. They burnt off an
awful sight of wheat that way, but they paid for it."

Across the road a man was ploughing, and he had
paused to give his panting mules a rest. "Where's
your boss?" my acquaintance called out. "I ain't
seen him around this morning. I thought he'd be out
here to cuss the mules, anyway."

"They need it," responded the ploughman. "These
mules are contrary, and you have to keep your eye on
'em all the time. We had a good pair last year, but the
boss sold 'em. He's the darndest man that way ever you

Historic Kansas 33

see. He'll swap or sell any creature he's got, right on
the road, if he meets anyone that wants to dicker with
him."

A crop of "cane" had been raised on the field the year
before. " It's a kind of sorghum," the man explained,
"and it makes awful nice feed. We raise it for our
cattle, but it's so sweet I believe this 'ere would be all
right for manufacturing sugar. The stalks grow eight
or ten feet high — every bit of it. We saved a powerful
lot of seed last fall and would have got more if it hadn't
been for the English sparrows. They're the worst
thing on earth for seed — them birds. There's lots of
'em around every farmhouse, and you've got to keep
all the holes stopped up or they'll be building their nest
into 'em. They drive away the other birds and are too
blamed lazy to hunt for food, and they pay no attention
to the bugs and worms. When you feed a mess to your
farm animals they eat it up for you, and they'll light on
your apple trees and pick a little small hole in nearly
every apple."

The field in which the ploughman was at work was
fenced with a thorny osage hedge, which he had trimmed
and adjusted during the winter so that it was "hog
tight." "There ain't nothing can go through that now,"
he affirmed; "but a hedge is no good, by gosh! unless
you take care of it. You need to trim it two or three
times a year so as to keep it branching, and you've got
to mow the weeds along the sides. That there little

34 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

green stuff you see comin' up in bunches near the hedge
is wild catnip. It is a good deal the same as tame catnip
that grows in the gardens, only it'll get up as high as
your head in summer, and unless you cut it the shade
will kill out the lower branches on the hedge. Some
farmers let the hedge alone until it's grown stalks big
enough to cut for wood and for posts. We think hedge
wood is equal to coal, and a hedge post will outlast one
of stone. Hedges are at present the commonest kind of
fencing here, but they are being gradually rooted
out. They take up too much room, and they sprout up
from the roots and keep crowding into the field all the
time, if they're neglected."

The ploughman now resumed his work and I plodded
on along the highway. About noon I stopped at a house
and asked for the privilege of staying to dinner. It was
not quite ready, but, as usual, I was welcome, "if I
would be satisfied with what they had," and I sat down
on the piazza where a lively small boy entertained me.
He pointed toward a near-by tree and said: "Do you
see the nest in that tree ? There's eggs in it, I betcher.
We got a pie-aner. That's my sister you hear playing
it. She learned how to play it at the high skewl."

He sang snatches of the song she was playing, and
then held up for my inspection the dry discarded shell
of a big beetle which he had in his hand. " It's a sizzery
bug," said he, poking it meditatively.

Starting his garden

Historic Kansas 35

Something snapped and he exclaimed: "Well, I'll be
dog-goned if I didn't shot one of his bones out!"

Just then the boy's father happened along and re-
marked: "That's a dry weather fly. They make a
kind of a funny noise buzzing with their wings. So the
kids call 'em sizzery bugs. We see 'em around most all
summer, but they don't do any harm that I've ever
heard anybody say."

The housewife now called us in to dinner. It was a
substantial and palatable meal, and one of the table
delicacies was white clover honey from hives in the
yard. "We had a swarm come out on Sunday," said
the woman, "and I told my husband I guessed the
weather was broke. Anyhow, it's been nice ever since,
and before that it was cold and disagreeable."

After we finished eating I asked how much I owed,
and when the woman answered rather doubtfully with-
out naming an amount I handed her twenty-five cents;
but she said fifteen cents was enough and wanted to
give me the difference.

During my afternoon ramble I stopped at one of the
humbler wayside homes to ask for a drink of water, and
a tall young man in overalls said he would draw some
fresh from the well in the yard. The well opening,
which was even with the ground, was covered by a few
loose boards, and the water was obtained by kneeling
and lowering a tin pail into its cool depths. Several
rods intervened between the well and the house — a

36 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

weatherbeaten little structure that had never been
painted. The barn was scarcely more than a shed, but
was supplemented by a cattleyard with a gigantic fence
of zigzag rails. Black pigs of various sizes wandered
about, free to go where they pleased, and the cows were
grazing in the highway. The young man and I sat
ilown for a chat on the borders of a mountainous pile of
wood that was near the back door sawed and split ready
for burning. He said "Dad" was a "fifty-sixer," by
which he meant that his father had arrived in Kansas
not later than 1856, when the struggle between the sup-
porters of slavery and abolition ended in the election of
a free-state legislature. " If you want to know anything
about those times he's the person to tell you," my com-
panion explained. " Some of 'em — their memory fails
'em; but that ain't so with Dad. He'll give you straight
goods right from the word go."

The old man was baiting cows and, with the help of
three dogs, seeing that they did not stray too far. He
presently came hobbling along on his cane and sat down
with us. In age and appearance he was a genuine
patriarch, one of the earliest pioneers. " When I first
got here," said he, "people was comin' in lookin' at the
country, but it was quite a number of years before they
began to take up land. I worked on the old Cahfornia
Trail freighting. Now and then I'd see a buffalo
skull on the prairie, but the buffaloes themselves were
gone and the hunting was nothin' extra. There were

Historic Kansas 37

wild turkeys, and a sprinkling of deer, and plenty of
coyotes; and you can tell the people back East that we
have coyotes here now that do lots of damage. I hear
'em howlin' every few nights.

" Plenty of trees grew along the river, but as soon as
you got out of the bottoms there wasn't a stick any-
where. It was bare as could be — all prairie, and the
most desolate lookin' country in the world. After the
frosts came in the fall the grass was as dry as a powder
house and the Injuns set fire to burn it off and run the
game into the timber. Me 'n' three other fellers come
pretty near gettin' caught in a prairie fire once. We
seen it far off, but we didn't think of any danger. By
and by we was goin' down hill and the big freight wagons
made so much noise we didn't notice anything unusual
until we heard a roarin ' and looked back and saw the
fire almost on us. Oh, my goodness! it was awful! I
hollered that we was goin' to be burnt up, and jumped
off to see if I could start a fire on the other side of the
road. The first match caught and the fire spread from
that on ahead of us as fast as a horse could run. We
drove onto the burnt ground just in time to save our-
selves from the fire behind.

"I took a claim over in the timber about two miles
from here in 1854 and built me a log cabin with a stone
chimney and a big fireplace. There wa'n't another
house to the north for fifty miles. Not long afterward
the settlers begun to come in rapid. Lawrence was the

38 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

Free State headquarters, and Massachusetts was rushin'
in as many people as it could to make Kansas anti-
slavery; and Missouri had a rival town of 'border
ruffians,' as we called 'em, and was tryin' to fix things
so this would be a slave state. We had some pretty
savage times. There was robbin' and murderin', and
we never knew when we was safe. One time my brother
and me was in Kansas City, and we found the border
ruffians was planning to make a raid on Lawrence. We
went and see 'em start, and then we was goin' to hurry
off home to give the alarm, but I took a chill and had to
lay there shakin' for two or three hours. After that we
rode as fast as we could until, half way home, some of
the outlaws caught me and made me give up my horse.
My brother escaped, though they shot at him twice.
The fellow that stole my horse tried to sell it later; but
a neighbor of mine see what he was doin' and pitched
onto him. Yes, he knocked him down and kicked him
so three of his ribs was broken. Later I got the horse,
but it had been run almost to death.

"The raiders burnt the Free State Hotel at Lawrence
and the printing office, and throwed the type in the
river. Then they went back. A while afterward the
Free State voters won in the election, and that ended
the border troubles. But things was worse than ever
during the Civil War. There was a gang in Lawrence
that called themselves Redlegs or Jayhawkers, and they
was about as bad an outfit as ever there was in any

A dooryard well

Historic Kansas 39

country. They claimed to be on the Union side, and
they'd raid down into Missouri and pretend that what
they stole was got from the rebs. But it didn't make
any difference who they robbed. If a man had property
he was their meat. There were cutthroats on both sides
in that war. By and by thirteen hundred guerrillas
come into Lawrence one August morning about sun-
rise. A company of colored troops was bein ' recruited
here, and the raiders begun shootin' them, and they
killed citizens, too — one hundred and fifty persons in
all. They broke open the safes in the banks and stores
and got a lot of money, and they burned about three-
fourths of the town buildings.

"One of the persons they particularly wanted to
shoot was the chaplain of Lane's regiment — a man
named Fisher. He was a pretty thrifty fellow. When
he was movin ' around with the troops over in Missouri
he'd gather up mules, which he'd send here and later
sell to the government. Once when they was in a rebel
town Colonel Lane come across him lookin' up at the
steeple on a church and asked him what was the matter.

"*I was just thinkin' how nice that spire would look
on my new church back in Kansas,' he says.

"'Take it right along. Brother Fisher; take it right
along,' says the colonel.

"Well, Fisher was in his house there at Lawrence,
and the raiders knew it, but they couldn't seem to find
him. His wife had hid him away somewhere in the

40 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

cellar. They give up searchin' and said they was goin'
to burn the house, and Mrs. Fisher asked if she could
get out some of the furniture first. They said she could,
and she managed to put him in some carpeting and
rolled him out of reach of the fire and piled chairs and
things on top so't the raiders never had any idea of the
trick she'd played 'em.

"I lived over by the crick then, and I'd be livin' there
now, only the man who owned this farm put at me for
a trade — half of my place for his eighty here. His'n
didn't suit him because it hadn't no wood on it. This
is a pretty good farm except that we sometimes run
skurce of water. But there's wells within a mile that
never fail, and we don't have the dry weather we used
to have, so we hain't hauled any water for six or
seven years."

While we talked, the cattle had strayed, and the old
man now turned to his son and said : "Them cattle won't
stay nowhar. Just go down the road and head 'em off
and run 'em in. They've e't enough."

This brought my visit to an end, and I wended my
way toward the town. It was a day of unusual warmth
for the season, and one of my local acquaintances had
remarked that, "When the weather gets so sultry it
generally winds up with a clap." Sure enough, that
night the wind roared threateningly about the hotel and
the rain fell in torrents, while the artillery of the heavens

Historic Kansas 41

flashed and crashed in wild menace. But in the morn-
ing the sun smiled down on the drenched earth, and
Kansas rejoiced, for the rain had made abundant crops
increasingly certain and bestowed still more wealth on
the wide realm of this great state's thrifty husbandmen.

Note. — Kansas has comparatively litde scenic attraction, except the
pastoral charm always associated with rich-soiled, well-cultivated farmlands.
This agricultural charm is nearly universal; but the eastern portion is
perhaps best worth seeing, for there one finds a repose that only comes with
age, and a humanized touch in the landscape which is conferred by long
association with mankind delving in the soil and making permanent homes.
Then, too, this eastern section has seen a stirring past, and it is a pleasure to
recall the wild incidents of the anti-slavery struggle, and of the Civil War
in the vicinity where those events occurred.

Lawrence, Topeka, Osawatomie, and other Kansas towns were founded
by colonies sent out by the Massachusetts Emigrants' Aid Society when the
extension of slavery was a vital question. Near Osawatomie, sixty miles
southwest of Kansas City, John Brown made his famous defense. Lawrence
is half way between Kansas City and Topeka. The motor route between
these cities is mostly a dirt road which is in good condition except after a
prolonged rainy spell.

The old Santa Fe Trail crossed the entire breadth of the state, and the
Santa Fe Railroad follows it closely. Nearly the whole length of the trail
is dotted with graves of savages, teamsters, hunters, and pioneer gold or
home-seekers. The trail started at Independence, ten miles east of Kansas
City, and was first travelled by the whites in 1820. There was serious
danger from Indian attacks by the time the present Dodge City, three-
fourths of the way across the state, was reached.

Kansas is the most central state in the union.

Ill

IN OKLAHOMA

ON the train that carried me into Oklahoma I
made the acquaintance of a citizen of the state
who proceeded to enlighten me as to the nature
of the country to which I was journeying. The climate
was superlatively healthy, the winters were not very
cold nor the summers very hot, the crops were always
bountiful, everybody with an atom of thrift was pros-
perous, and in character and intelligence the people
were the pick of the world.

"Why," said I, "Oklahoma is going to be one of the
finest states in the Union, isn't it ? "

"No," he responded, "it isn't going to be — it is now;"
and he went on to tell how progressive the state was,
and praised the excellence of their laws, and declared
that they enjoyed all the comforts that could be had
anywhere. He even affirmed that the wind was partial
to Oklahoma, and was seldom otherwise than gentle.
In his enthusiasm I suppose he exaggerated somewhat.
At any rate I cannot endorse his statement as to the
wind, for during a considerable portion of my stay it
was blowing like the mischief, and filling the air with a
gritty dust. One entire day it held me an indoor prisoner

Talking business

In Oklahoma 43

at Kingfisher, in the central part of the state. The gale
kept up a constant rattling and banging, even rocking
the three-story brick hotel I was in, and its fiercer gusts
seemed to threaten to sweep things away altogether.

However, there were other less boisterous days when
I contrived to do a good deal of rambling. Vegetation
was more than a month in advance of that in the north-
ern states. Roses were blooming in the gardens, and
the locust trees, which abounded both in the town and
about the farmhouses, perfumed the air with their
pendent clusters of blossoms. The wheat was knee-
high and billowy in the breeze, the corn was up, and
the cotton had been planted.

The newness of the country was not so apparent as I
expected. There are many Oklahoma towns still raw
and forlorn, but Kingfisher could boast of frequent sub-
stantial business blocks among the other slighter struc-
tures, and its dwellings had lawns and shrubbery and a
goodly showing of fair-sized shade-trees. Roundabout
the town the land rose and fell in long sweeps with an
occasional more sudden dip into a gully. The roads
were monotonously straight, and the turns were always
abrupt right-angles at the corners of the sections. Where
the roads crossed a hollow the mud had washed in from
the fields, and where they were on rising ground the
rains had worn deep ruts. The space between the
barbed wire fences that divided the fields from the high-
way was still the original prairie, and when a track be-

44 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

came very bad the teams simply started another to the
right or the left. In the pastures were numerous herds
of grazing cattle, and nearly every farmer had a drove
of hogs browsing in an alfalfa field.

One doubtful morning I accosted an old negro who
was fishing on the wooded banks of a muddy creek and
asked him if it was going to rain.

"You'll have to ask God," was the reply. "He
knows. I don't."

That a fisherman should have no opinion as to the
weather seemed to me strange, but I soon found out
that this ancient darkey fished every day from morn till
night; and whether the skies smiled or frowned made
no difference to him. What he caught was the principal
part of his food, and often he secured enough so that he
could sell a few pounds.

Shortly after I left him a shower made me seek shelter,
and I stopped at a snug little farmhouse with quite a
charming front porch covered all across, except the
entrance, by a flowering vine. The tall gray farmer was
presently telling me his experiences. "This is a good
country," said he, "when there's a sufficient rainfall in
the crop-growing season. But we been knocked out
two or three times by havin' it too dry. Another time
we had the green bug. Eighty acres of wheat and oats
that I'd put in never yielded a grain of anything. I
first noticed trouble in March. The wheat was turning
yellow, and I looked and see it was covered with little

In Oklahoma 45

green bugs. They jis' sucked the life out of it and left
it lookin' as if there'd been a drouth.

"I'm one of the first settlers in this region. The
country here was opened up on April 22d, 1889. About
two miles west of Kingfisher was the boundary, and it
was marked with posts and guarded by mounted sol-
diers. Nobody was supposed to cross the line until the
appointed time, but some did. We called them "soon-
ers," and their claims were no good if their early start
could beprovedon 'em. Quite a number of 'em had to go
to the pen for swearing falsely. People come from allover
to get a chance at this new land — and quite a few women
come as well as men. They were arrivin' for a week
beforehand and camped close by the line in tents or
lived in their covered wagons, and they brought their
ploughs and everything all ready to go to work.

"Twelve o'clock was the hour that the race was to
begin. We was there along the line ready, dozens
deep, and everybody was goodnatured and jokin' and
singin'. The crowd was plumb thick where I was be-
cause it was opposite a town site. Up and down as far
as we could see was the soldiers settin' on their horses
at regular intervals, and when the time come they gave
the signal by firin' their revolvers. Then we all rushed
forward as tight as we could go. You could take your
pick and have any one hundred and sixty acres you
wanted if you got it first. I was on foot and only run a
little way, but most were on horseback or muleback.

46 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

When I stopped I stood and watched the others going
on toward the town site under the whip jis' hke a horse
race. Oh, my stars! how they run! Most generally
each man took a spade with him, and as soon as he de-
cided he'd reached as good a piece of land as he was
likely to get he'd jump right off and go to diggin' to
throw up a little mound. On top of that he'd stick up a
shingle with his name on it. Then he'd go back to
camp, hitch up his team, and take it to his claim and
begin ploughing. But perhaps by the time he got there
he'd find someone else ploughing on that land. There
was a fuss then, sure. Often two or three would get on
the same claim and tear down each other's signs, and
they might keep on till they got into a shooting scrape.

"The next day the land office opened, and we began
to file our claims. When I got there considerable of a
line had already formed and I had to take my place at
the end and wait my turn. I stood there from morning
till night, and it was terribly windy, dusty and hot.
Fellers come around carryin' grub to us, and we'd buy
and eat it without leavin' the Hne. A long file of us was
still waiting when the land office closed for the day, and
some, in order not to lose their places, camped right
where they were.

"Those that did the best in the rush were the ones
that got the town lots. They made a good thing. But
I knew one old fellow who said he'd picked out the best
site in town and intended to start a hotel, and when they

a

In Oklahoma 47

surveyed he found his claim was right in the middle of a
street so he had to move. There were lots of disputes
for the courts to settle between parties on the same
claim.

"I had trouble about my claim with a widow who
seemed to think she was on it first. She was a very nice
old woman, and people joked considerable because I
was a widower, and they said our dispute could be fixed
up all right. But I got out.

"As a whole, the newcomers were a good respectable
class of people, and yet there were some pretty tolerable
rough ones. A horse thief took this claim that I'm on
now; but in a little while he sold out, stole what he
could, and left. There ain't only a few of the old settlers
that have stayed in the region. Most of 'em have gone,
and many places have changed hands three or four
times.

"Grub at first was most awful scarce, and we was
too late the first year to raise much except turnips and
watermelons and kaffir corn. But those turnips was
the biggest I ever did see. We fed 'em to our chickens,
fatted our hogs with 'em, and made slaw to eat ourselves.
The railroad hadn't been built, and all our supplies
were freighted in on wagons. Times got so hard lots of
men was discouraged. If a feller come along and
offered one hundred, one hundred and fifty, or two
hundred for a claim, the owner would very likely sell

48 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

and go back to his wife's people. But after we got our
first crop we began to hve and get ahead.

"I don't Hke the winter here. It's too chilly and
rainy. Then in the summer the weather is apt to get so
terribly hot we can hardly stand it. I shall always re-
member the second of May, 1892. I saw three cyclones
that day, and the last one I saw a little too plain. I'd
been to town for a load of lumber, and the air was so
red hot, I said to myself: *A storm'll come up after
this!' Oh, it was jis' so hot it almost burned me. Our
cows was in a corral down by the stream, and toward
night my hired man said it was time to go and milk 'em.

" ' I don't Hke the looks of the clouds,' I said, ' and I
ain't goin' away from the house, but if you want to do
the milkin' go ahead.'

"So he went along, and I stood right in the yard
watchin' the clouds. Pretty soon I see 'em comin' to-
gether from all directions about a mile south of us, and
I run to the house and told the folks we was goin' to
have a cyclone and they'd better get out. The safest
place I knowed of was a stable I'd dug about four feet
down into the ground. It was roofed over with sticks
and there was hay thrown on to shed the rain. We got
into a corner of that, and I said to my oldest son who
was man-grown: 'We'll stand over the balance of 'em
to kind o' protect 'em.'

"Then the storm passed above us with a roarin* noise
like a train, and the only harm it did to the stable was

In Oklahoma 49

to flop the hay from the north end onto the south end.
There wa'n't no time to think, it was all over so much
quicker than anything else that happens. I run out
and looked around, and there was no house nor any-
thing else hardly left. The hottest kind of air had come
from that cyclone, and I was nearly suffocated with it.
In the distance I could see the storm goin' off, and it
was plumb black. Three miles from here it struck a
house and killed a boy; and not far beyond there it
broke loose from the ground. A feller who happened
to be near by, and who had run into a patch of willows
to save himself, said it went up with a whistle jis' like
a steam engine.

" I told you how my hired man started to go to milk
the cows. About the time he got to the pasture the
wind come and knocked down a big sorrel horse that
was close beside him; but the horse wa'n't hurt and it
got up and run off across the field. The man saved him-
self by ketchin' hold of a little ellum tree, and he held
on until the worst was over. Then he hurried to see
whether we'd escaped. The house was tore all to pieces
and nothin' was to be found of it but spHnters. I had a
right new wagon in the yard that I hadn't used more'n
six months, and one of the tricks of the cyclone was to
take that wagon a mile up on the prairie, where it was
dropped with the iron parts all twisted up and the
wooden parts all broke to bits. At the corner of my
house stood a barrel of salt with a harness layin ' on it.

50 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

Well, sir, the cyclone left the harness there in a pile on
the ground, but took the barrel of salt and broke it up
and scattered it all around. Near the barrel I had a hen
and twenty chickens in a coop, but only one chicken
escaped. Such a storm will sometimes snatchthe feathers
all off of a hen. I've got a cyclone cellar now, and we
don't take any chances. When we see a storm comin'
up toward night on a hot day we jis' go in there for a
while."

I ate dinner at the old settler's and had an excellent
repast that was not at all in need of the housewife's
apologies for its shortcomings, except in the matter of
milk and butter. It seemed that wild onions abounded
in the pastures at this season and were much to the lik-
ing of the cows. As a result the milk was strongly
flavored, and the butter was neither good butter nor
good onions.

"We've sometimes thought we'd like to sell out;"
remarked the woman, " but when we wanted to sell we
couldn't, and when we could sell we wouldn't. I was
tellin' my daughter yesterday, says I: 'I'm ready to
move any time your paw is.' Don't you know, people
get awful tired of living at one place; but law! you lose
more in travellin' around than you gain."

"The Germans are buying up a good many of the
farms hereabouts," said the man, "and it don't take 'em
long to pay for a place."

Evening by the aeekside

In Oklahoma 51

"Well, and that's no wonder," commented the wo-
man. "They all work like dogs to get ahead — the
whole family, even the little tots no more than knee-
high to a duck. The children will drive the cattle three
or four miles, may be, to pasture, and the girls'll haul
to town and work in the fields. Them girls have a
whole lot better health, too, than American girls, be-
cause they're so much out in the air; and the women —
see how tough and hardy they are! I've heard tell that
Dutchmen wa'n't good to their wives, but that's a mis-
take. Their women would rather do field work than
not, and are often as much the boss of the farm as the
men. The American people are gettin' lazier and
lazier, and the women never think of working outdoors.
German girls will do all that a young man of their age'll
do except the heavy muscular work. You'll find 'em
out every day driving the ploughs and harrows and
binders, while American girls jis' stick around the
house."

"It ain't hard, running our machines," said the man.
"Take ploughing — you can sit on the seat and ride, and
when you get tired of that you can walk along behind.
Our fields are usually pretty level and they're often half
a mile across, and you drive right along with no change
only to turn at the corners. After you've adjusted your
plough at the start to have it go as deep as you want it
should, you don't have to touch it all day. A girl of
thirteen, who can drive, is jis' as good at ploughing as a

52 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

man. Why, I had a nigger once workin' for me, and
he used to hunt rabbits while his team ploughed."

"I was raised up to cook and take care of the house
for a family of five," said the woman, " and I thought I
was a terrible worker; but my father told me I didn't
know nothin' about work, and I reckon he was right.
It would be a good thing if farmers' wives were more
expert out of doors, for then if a woman was ever left a
widow it wouldn't paralyze her."

" Late years it's been almost impossible to git hands,"
the man observed. "There used to be fellers come along
and beg for work, but they don't any more. We hired
niggers considerable until they got too triflin' and
ornery. The only way to git a nigger on the farm now
is to rent him a few acres for a share in the crop, and
furnish him everything to work with. A number of 'em
owns land here. They went and tuck up claims in
some sandy country that the whites didn't think was
worth anything, and they raise good cotton there. A
few years ago one of these colored men got up a colony
to go to Africa. They sold out their claims for five or
six hundred dollars apiece and started. A good many
become discouraged and turned back at New York, but
others went on clear to Africa. They didn't like it
there, though. The climate didn't suit 'em, and some
died, and all the rest come back that was able to do so."

"The darkeys are jis' no account on earth," declared
the woman. " Let "em live among you and have their

In Oklahoma 53

own way, and they would lead you a merry gait. They
sure are overbearing. I drove into one of their yards in
town by mistake and across a corner of a garden, and a
woman come out and give me fits for goin' on her land.
Apologies didn't make any difference. She kept right
on a-scoldin'. It made me feel awful cheap. In some
towns they won't allow any darkey after sunset. The
darkeys, too, have several towns of their own where
they make the same laws about the whites."

The Indians are another race much in evidence in
the region. Industrially they do not count at all, but
they come and go on the trains and loiter in purposeless
meditation for hours at a time on the town streets. It
was quite evident that they did not have to work to live,
and that they had been wholly unable to get into har-
mony with the white man's civilization. One of the
town merchants who had dealt with them a good deal
enlightened me as to their habits.

" They have a monthly allowance of eight or ten dol-
lars apiece from the government," said he, "and when
their lands were set off a few years ago every darn one
of 'em, little and big, got a quarter section. That land
they lease, and it brings 'em a nice little income. The
whites raise wheat on it; but if an Indian would let a
white man build his home on the land, the white man
could agree to hand over a third of the crop, and when
the time come give him a fifth, and both parties be better
off than at present.

54 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

" If an Indian gets any money, he ain't happy till he
spends it. Maybe he'll buy a two hundred and fifty
dollar carriage, and he'll ride around in it for a while
and leave it out in the rain and the broiling hot sun till
the paint comes off. Then he'll drive to town and sell
it for fifty dollars or possibly thirty-five. Perhaps in-
stead of a carriage he'll buy a team and pay seventy-five
dollars on it and give a mortgage for the rest. By and
by he gets hard up and raises a little money by mort-
gaging the team to someone else. In the end the first
man duns for the balance that's due him, and the In-
dian surrenders the team and loses what he'd paid.
At one time the government furnished the Indians with
brand-new, spankin'-nice ploughs. But they just let
'em lie around. Such ploughs would cost twenty-five
dollars apiece, and yet if a white man come along and
offered three dollars for one the Indian would sell. He
didn't like the plough anyway.

"I know an Indian out here named Little Snake,
who owns fifteen quarters of land and has built a three-
room house. One day he bought a wagon-load of furni-
ture in town. I saw him driving past with it on his way
home, and I made the remark to my wife, 'What in
thunder do you s'pose Little Snake wants of that bunch
of furniture ? '

"Well, he'd bought a lot of bug juice here, too, and
he was drunk before he left the town, and by the time
he reached home he was good and drunk. Amongst

In Oklahoma 55

the rest of his new furniture was a nice dresser, and
when he was unloading that dresser the next morning
he saw himself in the mirror, and he thought the glass
was libelling him. He's got a nose five times as big as
mine, and it's all pitted with the smallpox — so he's no
beauty at any time, and he looked rather worse than
usual on account of his drunk. He wouldn't stand for
what he saw in the mirror, and he took a hammer and
smashed the glass all to pieces.

" Another Indian bought a hearse at a cost of several
hundred dollars. He'd never before seen anything in
the line of a riding carriage that was quite so grand, and
he used to take great pride in driving around the country
with it. Oh, these Indians are the most careless, do-
less people on earth. The tribes used to be fightin'
each other all the time, and now that they ain't allowed
to fight they're at a loss how to spend their time. Some
of the young fellows are quite civilized and smart; but
the old bucks are wild — ^just like a buffalo — ^you can't
teach 'em anything. There's only one Indian I know
of in the whole compoodle of 'em who'll mow his own
grass. But they will occasionally band together and
work in the harvest, and they'll pick cotton. Then, too,
the women do considerable of this bead work that's
sold in the stores.

"They don't trust us. They think every white man
is beating them. 'White man lie,' they say. I don't
trust the Indians any more than they trust us. They've

56 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

always stuck me on everything I've sold 'em unless I've
got my pay at the time. They travel about a good deal
on the trains or on horseback. You don't see 'em goin'
afoot. They're too lazy. They won't even exert them-
selves to fish or hunt — though if an eagle shows up
they'll follow that till doomsday to get it. They use the
feathers to make a war bonnet, which they keep as a
choice piece of finery. But sooner or later they get hard
up and bring it to town and sell it for from fifteen to
twenty-five dollars. If you start in to hunt on their land
they'll very soon see you and come and look and look,
standing first on one foot and then on the other. Finally
they'll speak and say, 'No hunt, no hunt.'

"'Well,' you say, 'I just want to shoot a few rabbits
and quail. I won't get 'em all.'

" But they repeat: 'No hunt, no hunt!'

"Then you put your hand in your pocket and pay
'em fifty cents, and you can hunt all you want to, and
Mr. Indian won't show himself again that day.

"They all like firewater. It's against the law to sell
it to 'em; but they'll give some low down nigger or
other cuss a dollar and tell him to go and get them a
pint. So he'll buy a pint for fifty cents and keep the
change, and'll hide the bottle in a place agreed on where
the Indians can find it. I've known these fool Indians
to buy patent medicines and flavoring essences to drink
for the alcohol that's in 'em. After a fellow's got medi-

c
O

In Oklahoma 57

cine enough inside to feel happy he perhaps gets on his
horse and gallops it up and down the street. He ain't
content with just plain riding, and he makes the horse
r'ar up and go along on its haunches. As soon as the
horse stops the Indian tumbles off. In some cases drink
makes the drinkers ugly, and two or three of 'em'll go to
fighting and pretty near chop each other all up; or
they'll want to go on a stampede and scalp the first
white man they meet."

The nearest of the various Indian camps in the vicin-
ity was Chief Bullbear's, about three miles from the
town and nearly a mile from the highway. One morn-
ing I went to have a look at it. In order to get to the
scattered group of houses that comprised the homes of
the half dozen families who accepted Bullbear as their
chief I had to crawl through several barbed wire fences.
These inclosed the big pastures and cultivated fields,
most of which had been leased to the whites. The
fences were not at all romantic, nor were the Indian
homes much more so. The banks of the creek were
wooded, but the houses were on the level prairie, and
their bareness was unrelieved by trees, vines or gardens.
Through an open door I observed one family at break-
fast. At the far side of the room was a cook-stove with
shiny nickel decorations; but there were no chairs or
tables, and the dishes and food were distributed all over
the floor. Men, women, and children were squatted
about amid the medley and were apparently going to
spend most of the day at their feast.

58 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

BuUbear's house was painted sky blue with red trim-
mings. In one corner of the yard was a pump that
looked as if it would not work, in which respect it was
like its owner. Four or five half-wild dogs were loiter-
ing around, and they growled at me suspiciously.

BuUbear sat on the edge of the little piazza, a grim
and wrinkled patriarch. To his right and left, perched
along in a row, were a number of squaws and children.
One of the women, Hattie Stumphorn by name, had
been to school in her youth, and could talk very good
English; but except for her first name and her linguis-
tic ability I could not see that she was much different
from the rest of the Indians. I had hoped to find them
living in tepees. There was, however, only one tepee in
the camp. This was in a yard and served the family
for a warm weather residence. Near the tepee I was
interested to observe a lawn mower. It was in the midst
of a grass patch, and I inferred that the owner had been
disappointed in it and had stopped right there dis-
couraged. Probably he was surprised to find it was
more work than fun to run the contrivance.

In a pasture not far away was a prairie dog village
which I found decidedly more lively than the Indian
camp. Around each burrow was a conical heap of dirt
with the hole in the middle, and these mounds, a rod or
two apart, scattered away as far as I could see. On
the mounds that were at a safe distance the little dogs
sat upright watching me; while on the mounds some-

In Oklahoma 59

what nearer were other dogs, likewise watchful, but
standing on all fours ready to dodge down Into the holes.
Each dog kept up an incessant racket of short, squeaky
barks; and at every yelp he gave a jerk to his tiny tail.
Numerous small gray owls were sitting on the mounds
with the dogs, or flitting about. Many rattlesnakes also
dwell in the dog towns and are to be found at home in
the burrows with the dogs and owls. These various
creatures constitute a friendly and happy family, ex-
cept that the snakes have an unfortunate habit of eat-
ing the young dogs.

Other wild life was not lacking in the Indian vicinity.
Sometimes a long-legged Jack rabbit would streak
away with the swiftness of the wind for a short distance,
then pause a moment with alert, sensitive ears to study
my intentions; sometimes a half dozen quail sprang
into sudden flight from beside my path; and once a
crane, known as a "shikepoke," flew up from a wet
hollow with dangling legs and broad wings and dis-
appeared over the trees that bordered the creek.

When I returned to the highway the chief from the
next camp beyond Bullbear's came along in a shabby
old buggy, driving a scrawny pair of ponies. He at once
offered me a ride, and I went to town in his company.

On my last evening in Kingfisher I came across a bit
of news in a local paper that ran as follows:

" While our town has long borne the name of being
the home of some of the most distinguished and politi-

6o Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

cal men of Oklahoma she has another honor — one
which very few of the largest cities can boast. This
new honor is brought upon us by a woman, Mrs. I. S.
Blank, the only successful lady novelist in the State of
Oklahoma. Mrs. Blank's great gift has been known to
only a few very intimate friends until a short time ago
when her first publication was accepted by a Boston
publisher. The novelist receives ^35,000 for the copy-
right, and five hundred volumes as a gift from the pub-
lishing company. The novel will contain a beautiful
lithograph of the lady composer. Mrs. Blank is in the
prime of life, highly cultured and educated. During
her early residence here she was a leader in social cir-
cles, but growing weary of the general routine of func-
tions she withdrew from society and of late years has
devoted her time to the home life, and here in the pri-
vacy of her own home she has put her noble thoughts
in volume, to be read and enjoyed by generations to
come."

When I perused the above and heard from the towns-
people that the lady herself had made the statements
printed about her book I could not doubt but that the
town indeed had a really remarkable romancer.

Note. — I think the attraction of Oklahoma for the stranger con-
sists largely in its newness, and in observing what progress has been
made in the short period that has elapsed since it became a white man's
land. Wherever you go, the wonder is to find so much accomplished
and such numbers of people and large towns where were only prairie

In Oklahoma 6i

and Indians a few years ago. Visit Guthrie and Oklahoma City for examples
of what the state's larger communities are, and go out and see something of
the vastness of the farming country. The Indians, too, are worthy of atten-
tion, though amid the tides of civilization flowing around them and the busy
agricultural thrift of the whites, they seem incongruous, and at a loss to
make the transition from the savage freedom of their fathers to the worka-
day necessities of the present.

Oklahoma became a state in 1907. The name, which means "the home of
the red man, " originally applied to a fertile stretch near the center of the
old "Indian Territory." This had been set aside by the United States for
the friendly Indians, and the government pledged its faith, that no white
settlers should be allowed to occupy the reservation. But by 1880 violators
of this law were causing much disturbance. The " boomers, "as they were
called, knew the value of the land, and repeatedly marched in from the
Kansas border. They were steadily repulsed by United States officials,
sometimes with the aid of troops, and President Cleveland assured them
that the laws against the immigration of whites would be vigorously enforced.
However, in 1889, the reservation was opened to settlement, and there was
an amazing inrush of settlers and adventurers. Tent towns with thousands of
inhabitants sprang up in a single day. The development of the "Boomers
Paradise," as Oklahoma has been called, into a flourishing agricultural
district has since been phenomenal. The inhabitants of the state include
about 50,000 Indians, and for each of them an inalienable homestead of
l6o acres has been reserved. As a rule they rpnt their land to white culti-
vators.

Kingfisher, in the vicinity of which I spent most of my time, can be reached
by automobile from Wichita, Kansas, a ride of 161 miles. But a much
shorter route is from Oklahoma City.

IV

A TEXAS BUBBLE

FOR hundreds of miles, as the train sped along
toward the Gulf, I had been in typical Southern
country. That is, there were long reaches of oak
and pine forest, and little sawmill villages, and negro
cabins with stick and clay chimneys at one end, and
many broad acres of corn and cotton. My destination
was Beaumont, and during the final hour or two I ob-
served that the streams and pools beside the tracks had
an oily scum on them. A further evidence that I was
coming into the famous oil region was the odor of the
smoke from the steam engine, for oil has long been the
standard fuel of the railroads in this district.

Beaumont became a bonanza oil town in 1901, and
the story of its rise to fame is decidedly picturesque.
This story has often been told, but I got a fresh version,
with many touches of originality, from a local citizen
who participated more or less in the events which he
chronicled, and I repeat his words.

" The discoverer of the great underground supply of
oil was a young one-armed fellow named Higgins who
worked logging on the river. I'll tell you how he hap-

A Texas Bubble 63

pened to have only one arm. Way off on the edge of
the town, where it was just wilderness in those days,
was a nigger church; and one night, when the niggers
was havin' a meetin', Higgins and a few other lads
went out there to have some fun. They commenced
rocking the church — throwing stones up on the roof —
and a policeman come along and tried to arrest 'em.
Higgins drew a revolver. The policeman did the same
and put a bullet in Higgins' right arm. That made the
lad drop his revolver, but he picked it up in his left
hand and shot the policeman dead; and the next morn-
ing he was before the court and exonerated. His arm
was taken ofF, and after he got well he went back to the
river. He couldn't go jumping around on the logs the
way he had before, and the sawmill give him a job at
the boom, where it was his business to push the logs
with a spikepole so the grip would catch 'em and draw
'em from the water up to the saws. All he got was a
dollar and a half a day, and he began to figure on how
he could make more money.

"About four miles out of town, at a place we call
Spindletop, was kind of a greasy mudhole where gas
bubbled up, and Higgins got the idea that oil could be
found there. So from time to time he'd interest some
person to furnish money to do a little boring. Pretty
soon, however, his financier would get discouraged and
quit; but Higgins was a fighting dog, and he never did
give it up himself. As often as he could save up a hun-

64 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

dred dollars he'd go to Spindletop and work his derrick.
Nobody paid much attention to him. The land wasn't
good for a thing in the world so far as crops were con-
cerned. You couldn't even raise a disturbance on it.

" Finally Higgins got hold of a Pennsylvania oil man
named Lucas who knew just how to do the drilling, only
he didn't have much money and presently went broke.
He was about to quit discouraged, but his wife prevailed
on him to bore one day more, and that day, about noon,
they struck a gusher which blowed their apparatus and
everything all to Guinea. Lucas didn't lack for money
after that, and he blossomed out in tailor-made clothes
and a plug hat. The Beaumont people had been cussin'
and abusin' him when he couldn't pay his debts, but
now he was a great man to them. They'd watch him
on the streets and point him out to strangers. 'I see
him,' they'd say. 'That is Captain Lucas just going
past.'

" Beaumont was at that time the dangdest old ram-
shackle wooden sawmill town you ever saw. There
wa'n't much here but mud and slabs; but in a little
while the place was known all over the United States.
Talk about California and Colorado! — the excitement
over the gold finds there wa'n't in it with what we ex-
perienced here. You see that Lucas well was an un-
usual one. Seventy thousand barrels of oil flowed from
it every twenty-four hours. People went crazy, and the
land for miles around soared up in price out of sight.

Some of the tanks among the derricks

A Texas Bubble 65

Not only those interested in oil flocked in, but crooks
and thugs and light-fingered gentry from all over the
earth. This was the capital of toughdom, and if you
didn't let your money sHp to the sharpers by gambling,
they'd lay in wait for you and knock you in the head.

"We perhaps had ten thousand transients in the place
when the excitement was at its height, and rents were
something terrible. Tents were put up all over town,
and beds set in 'em in rows like in a hospital. To sleep
in one of those beds cost a dollar a night. When I first
reached town none of the streets were paved, and the
heavy teams constantly going and coming made 'em a
deep rutted bog. Oh, my gracious alive! you never saw
such a mess, and it seemed to rain mighty near ever'
day, too.

"A good many experienced oil men at first thought
the Lucas gusher was a freak, and they weren't game
enough to take hold of the property. So others got
ahead of them. Some of the investors made fortunes,
but about ninety-nine per cent lost instead. Many a
person come here rich and left with nothing — had to
walk to get away, and perhaps went barefooted at that.
They'd arrive with their hands full of money, and beg
for the chance to buy some land, and often they was
sold land that never existed. I know there was a tramp
beating his way West on a freight train, and when he
got to Beaumont he see a dickins of a commotion on the
street — people running up and down — and he says,
'Here's where I'm goin' to get off.'

66 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

"He hadn't heard anything about the discovery of
oil at Spindletop, and he wanted to find out what was
the matter. After working a few days till he understood
things, he got a drygoods box to stand on and went to
selling land on a street corner. He didn't have any to
sell, and yet he cleaned up two hundred thousand dol-
lars and got away with the money.

" Some of the speculators were honest in their inten-
tions, but the oil-producing district is quite limited, and
these fellows bought anywhere and everywhere. Then
they'd organize a company and begin disposing of
stock. Usually though, their wells wouldn't strike oil
in paying quantities, or were only dusters — that is, they
had been bored down into dry sand.

"Those speculators who were dishonest often didn't
invest in land or boring at all, but simply started a
company and sold stock to suckers. They'd perhaps
pay big dividends for a short time to coax forth more
money from their victims, and then pocket the cash.

"But if there was lots of crookedness and disap-
pointment, some of those Spindletop wells were wonders
and no mistake; and the oil men kept boring them in
spite of the fact that there was no way of taking care of
the oil— no tanks, no pipe line, no refinery, not even a
road to town. They simply turned the oil loose for the
edification of the curious public. Why, for two or three
years the ditches here in town were running with that
black oil, and every stream in the region flowed with a

A Texas Bubble 67

coating an inch or more thick. It gave ofF quite a rank
smell, and we had also a strong odor of gas escaping
from the Spindletop wells. Besides that, the gas ate off
the paint from the houses, and they looked shabby and
neglected, even if they were painted two or three times
a year. But we've no reason to complain now. The
industry has been thoroughly organized and nothing is
wasted. It is supposed that the Standard Oil Company
controls the bulk of the business. Their policy is to let
others do the wild-catting and then step in and reap the
harvest.

"The boom certainly did wake up Beaumont; and,
sir, you have no idea how this blame place is growing.
It's the best town in old Texas. You'd be surprised
how much wealth we've got here. Several of the Beau-
mont boys got to live on Easy Street through oil invest-
ments, and Higgins is at the head of the biggest oil com-
pany in the state. He has an income of sixteen hun-
dred dollars a day. Then there's all those who've been
made rich by the enormous increase in the value of land
in and near the town. But it ain't just oil that's built up
Beaumont. Lumber and rice are responsible, too; and
I believe there's more capital invested in rice than in
oil."

When I journeyed out to see Spindletop it was with
the expectation of finding a steep, rounded hill, but the
name originated in a clump of tall trees that grew in the
vicinity and made a cone-shaped mass of foliage that

68 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

was a landmark for the old settlers on the adjacent
prairie. The oil district is on slightly rising ground
covering a circular patch scarcely a mile across. It is a
leafless, angular forest of derricks — a dismal, blasted
tract wholly devoid of beauty, natural or artificial.
You hear the hissing of steam, the throbbing of engines,
you see whirling wheels and the pumps moving with
unceasing regularity, and there are grimy men at work
singly and in groups. But the men are few and scat-
tered for such a jungle of derricks. One engine does
the pumping for half a dozen wells, and everything has
been so simplified that a single man's guiding hand
accomplishes what would seem to be work for a dozen.
The drill consists of a six-inch pipe, and this has to
go down about a thousand feet to strike the oil strata.
The best well in the tract produces five hundred barrels
a day, but the average is less than fifty barrels, and
pumping continues even if the yield is only seven or
eight. A near-by pit, a few yards across, serves each
group of wells and receives the oil and the water with
which it is mixed. The latter sinks to the bottom and
is allowed to flow away into a ditch, while the former
runs to a second pit and is then pumped into a stout
tank. Finally, after some further settling, the oil is
piped to the rows of great storage tanks a mile or two
away. A well is seldom productive over two years, and
new borings are constantly being made. The wonder-
ful gusher which first brought fame to the region went

Neighbor meets neighboi

A Texas Bubble 69

dry long ago, and nothing is left of it but a hole on the
edge of a marsh. The engines are either protected by
rude sheds or stand in the open. They burn oil and
have open fronts, and when you look in and see the
fierce flames flashing up and dying down, and hear the
roaring indraft of air, they seem like demoniacal mon-
sters endowed with life.

Off" at one side of the field were a few short streets of
shanty homes where the help dwelt, and which did not
in the least relieve the chaotic and uninviting aspect of
the oil-well territory.

The work of the employees is of necessity dirty and
disagreeable. "I've been baptized completely many
times," said one of them. "When we used to strike
gushers, up the oil would go and come right down on
you. Worse still was the gas. It seems to occur in
little pockets and will burst forth all of a sudden, so
that if you don't look out you're a gone chicken. It
only takes one or two whiff's of it to stop your clock, and
the other fellers come to your rescue in a hurry. They
pick you up by the nape of the neck, and give you a hit in
the back and roll you around and throw water over
you. It's surprisin' how quick the stuff acts. There
was an old negro woman out here lookin' on when we
struck gas once, and she said, 'I smell somethin' jus'
like b'iled cabbage.' Then over she went. It was in
the time of the gushers that we had most trouble with
gas. Of course it was important to cap a well as soon

7© Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

as possible to stop the oil from running to waste, and
I've seen owners beggin' men to work and offering 'em
two dollars an hour. The men who undertook the job
would have a rope hitched to 'em, so that when they'd
run in where the oil was spouting and was overcome
by gas they could be dragged out. Finally they got to
using diving suits."

A few years ago Beaumont had for a short time the
reputation of being "miserable sickly;" but this was
apparently due to incidental conditions that soon passed
away, for the inhabitants claim the town has one of the
best health records of any place in the United States.
"Why," said one informant, "we had to kill a man to
start a graveyard. Later, when the boom was on, a
Northern man died here. There was talk of send-
ing the body back to his friends; but finally it was de-
cided to bury him here, and on the way to the graveyard
he come to life. If he'd gone North he'd have stayed
dead."

The town is on a slight plateau bordering the Naches
River, and across the stream are wooded swamplands
with a thick undergrowth of palmetto scrub. "That's
a fine place for fishing in the bayous over there," re-
marked a man I met on the river bank; "but there's
millions of mosquitoes, too, and at times we have the
confounded things by the bushel right here in town.
They'll kill young chickens — ^just prod 'em to death —
and I've known 'em to kill cattle by pestering 'em so

A Texas Bubble 71

they'd run into a bog and lay down and die. Weather
that's quiet and hot suits 'em best; but a wind will put
'em out of business, and you won't see 'em nowhere.
Whenever they harpoon me real bad I have the malaria
next day, sure.

"I used to be an engineer on the railroad; and along
the coast the mosquitoes in the grass that lopped over
on the rails would get crushed and grease the track so
the engine wheels would slip. Sometimes that brought
the train to a standstill, and we'd have to take a broom
and get out and sweep and scrape and throw on sand.
Then we'd start up and run as hard as we could to get
beyond the grassy spot.

"I see by the paper the cyclones are hitting the
country to the north and east pretty hard. We don't
have 'em here, but we do get an occasional West India
hurricane. I was in the one we had in June, 1884. It
made a tidal wave that killed everybody at Sabine Pass
and wiped Indianola off the face of the earth. Indiano-
la had been quite a shipping place, but nobody lived
there afterward except an old negro native of the place,
who happened to be away at the time of the disaster.
When it was over he went back to where his master had
lived and built him a shack of the wreckage, and there
he stayed till he died.

"I remember the day of the storm very well. It
opened blustering, and about the middle of the fore-
noon the wind blew a gale for forty-five minutes. I

72 Highways and Bjrways of the Rocky Mountains

was takin' a passenger train south and was within two
miles of Sabine Lake when I saw a wave of water five
or ten feet high sweeping along over the level prairie
toward us and carrying wreckage and boats and every-
thing with it. A schooner — a great big feller over a
hundred feet long — was taken clear across the track
right in front of us, and the water come up on the deck
of the engine, by jingoes! But the crest of the wave
passed on and we were glad to find that nobody on the
train was hurt. Our tracks were under water for several
hours and we da'sen't go ahead or back with the train
because of washouts. Late in the day we waded to dry
land, following the track for about six miles; and the
weather was then quiet and nice as could be. The
train stayed there two months before the track could be
put in shape to move it."

My companion pointed to a man who had come along
the path where we stood and was now several rods
beyond us. "That feller's got a pistol in his pocket,"
said he. " I done had my eye on him ever since he went
past, and when the wind blows his coat against his side
you can see the pistol is there all right. The law don't
allow carryin' pistols, but a Southern man believes
that's one of his born rights. I come here from Mary-
land, and I've looked down a gun more than once when
the hole seemed to be six feet in diameter; but I can
say this for the Texas people — I've never knowed any-
body to be killed down here but what pretty near de-

A Texas Bubble 73

served his fate. Usually the man killed is a feller who's
butted in and tried to bulldoze somebody. If you come
here a stranger and behave yourself they'll just tear
their shirts trying to do any favor for you that you may
ask. They very seldom kill a man on the sly, but of
course they go out and shoot each other to settle a dis-
pute. The shooting is soon over, and is all right — the
burial expense ain't much, and the relatives pay that.
The county don't have to bear it. If they both don't
get killed there's a case for the courts, and that puts
money in circulation for lawyers' fees. Among the old-
time Texans one shot apiece was enough. There wa'n't
any such thing as missing, and I could tell you of dozens
of instances of duels where both parties was killed.

"Some curious things happen here in connection
with law and order. I recall one Texas judge in a
thinly settled district who kept a saloon and held court
in the same room. Once a dead man was found in the
vicinity with forty dollars and a revolver in his pockets,
and the judge fined him the forty dollars for carrying
the gun."

Within a range of about thirty miles are several other
oil pockets scarcely less notable than that at Spindletop,
and I decided to visit the one at Sour Lake. On the
way thither I had a chance to see the rice country sweep-
ing away in apparently limitless levels with its network
of canals and ditches. As the train went farther we
entered a region of alternating prairie and forest, and

74 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

in the opens were numerous nerds of cattle. There was
no fencing along the tracks, and once the engine gave a
series of sharp toots, the brakes were applied, and the
train slowed up with jarring suddenness. "We most
hit a yearling that time," said a man who had put his
head out of a window.

The stock take care of themselves the year through,
and ordinarily fare worst during the dry summer months.
In the winter, if the weather is mild, they find feed
plentiful. Snow is a rarity, and yet in 1895 the region
had a storm that buried the earth in white a foot and
a half deep, and many of the herds were almost wiped
out. The golden period of the Texan cattle business
was somewhat earlier. Then, in vast portions of the
state, there was nothing but great grazing ranches, and
the grass grew as high as a man's waist. " When a cow
lay down in it," a former cowboy explained to me, " she
was entirely lost to sight except the tip of her horns.
But that grass has all been killed out by the excessive
browsing and trampling. The cattle men lived in little
log cabins or cheap box houses that the wind would
blow right through. You never saw a door locked, and
when you was on a journey and stopped for a drink of
water at a house where no one was at home, you went
right in and helped yourself, and if you shut the door
as you went out the owner was perfectly satisfied. You
could take anything you needed and welcome, except
a horse. Steal one of the rancher's horses and he'd

A hog family

A Texas Bubble 75

hang you if he could get hold of you. It didn't matter
so much if you stole a yearling. You see all the balance
of 'em did that."

Sour Lake was originally a health resort of the In-
dians. The lake was simply a small pond, the water of
which was impregnated with sulphur and other minerals,
and in the near-by woods were various peculiar springs
that came to be recognized among the savages as bene-
ficial for certain diseases. Indeed, some of the local
dwellers claim that, " all the Indians in Texas " used to
go there in April every year and camp in the neighbor-
hood for several weeks, drinking the water and wallow-
ing in the greasy bogholes. Among those who resorted
to the springs, there came, about 1825, a boy who was
half Indian and half negro, and as he grew older he
adopted the spot as his home and became known as
Dr. Mudd. He used to relate an Indian legend to the
following purport:

This part of Texas was formerly very dry and en-
tirely devoid of streams or other bodies of water. At
length the Indians prayed to the Great Spirit to change
the country and supply it with brooks and rivers. So
the Great Spirit told them to move up into middle Texas
for a few weeks. This they did, and while they were
there the ground in the region from which they had
come shook and split open, and streams formed. The
center of the disturbance was at Sour Lake where oc-

76 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

curred "a tremendous terrible blowout," and when
they returned, after the earth had quieted down, they
found the medicinal pond and springs.

Dr. Mudd acquired something of a reputation for
his knowledge of the healing properties of the different
springs and bogs, and more and more people came to be
cured of rheumatism and skin and blood diseases.
Persons afflicted with these ailments were often greatly
helped, but the place "would sure knock you out," if
you had a tendency to lung trouble. Presently someone
erected a large, pillared hotel near the springs, and it
became the annual habit with many planters to bring
their families from the low, malarial rivers to Sour Lake
and stay through the summer. Not all of them lived in
the hotel. Some preferred to put up a house of their
own or to camp in a tent. They were accustomed also
to bring their sick negroes to spend a few weeks.

The negro doctor had driven a pipe down into the
soil about twenty feet, and it slowly dripped a sulphur
oil that he put up in vials and sold for a liniment. He
called it "Sour Lake Tar." The doctor was a very
religious old darkey who revered God and was afraid
of the devil; and when the first gusher came in he said
that the oil men were destroying God's health resort.
God would punish them, he declared, the same as He
did those who started to build the tower to heaven, and
in order to escape the wrath to come Dr. Mudd departed.

A Texas Bubble 77

The first actual drilling in the region was done in
1896 by some West Virginia men. After going down
two hundred and fifty feet they got a flow of thick oil
which they concluded would be very good for lubricat-
ing purposes. They shipped some to the sawmills
around, but when the machines to which it was applied
became warm the odor of the oil was extremely offen-
sive, and the mill workmen would not use it. This dis-
couraged the prospectors, and Sour Lake continued to
be a quiet health resort until after the "boom was on
big" over at Beaumont. Then several drillers came
here, and pretty soon the oil was running out all over
everything in tens of thousands of barrels a day. There
was no settlement worth mentioning — ^just a hotel and
a little church, a schoolhouse and a few scattered dwell-
ings. Close to where the oil was struck lived an elderly
Irishman named Pat Cannon. He was a peddler who
drove a wagon around the country selling needles and
thread and a few drygoods. Mostly he had to take
chickens and eggs in exchange. Before oil was found
the land in the vicinity was worth about twenty-five
cents an acre, but now the price jumped. Cannon had
an old tumble-down place with the weeds and brush
growing all around. He entirely lacked knowledge of
large business transactions, and very likely the oil men
would have swindled him out of his property; but a
relative who was more used to affairs said to him : " See
here, you just get out of the way and let me handle this
for you."

78 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

So after some bargaining Cannon sold part of his
land for one hundred thousand dollars and leased more
for an eighth of the oil that was produced. On the day
of the sale he had just thirty-six cents in his house.

As soon as oil was struck, crowds of adventurers and
speculators, workers and sightseers began to flock in,
and, as one informant declared: "People just had to
stand out all night. I golly! they couldn't get no place
to sleep. Drinking water had to be brought from a
distance and was worth more than the oil. Water sold
for fifty cents a barrel and oil for ten. Pretty near all
the people have done gone and left us now so there's
only about two thousand inhabitants."

It was thought at the time of the boom that Sour Lake
was going to be a big city, and all the surrounding re-
gion was laid off in streets. The present town is for the
most part a scattered, dingy settlement of unpainted
wooden shanties, and big forlorn structures that were
formerly boarding-houses. Along either side of the
dusty, littered chief street are shabby stores and saloons,
usually one story high with a covered veranda in front.
The floors of the verandas varied so much in elevation
and were so broken it seemed rather adventurous walk-
ing on them. In the ditches at the edge of this crazy
sidewalk were oily pools and mudholes. Dogs abounded,
and so did razor-backed hogs and grazing horses and
cattle, and they all went just where they pleased. If
anyone objected to the liberties they took he fenced his

On the hotel piazza

A Texas Bubble 79

premises against them. Those freaks of hogs some-
times sauntered along on the veranda walks and would
even take a look in at the saloons as if they recognized
some of their kin in the loafers there.

I stayed at a hotel in a grove of noble live oaks and
sweetgums that were festooned with long tresses of gray
moss. The hotel quite charmed me at first with its
stout whitewashed fence inclosing the yard, and its
broad upper and lower galleries on two sides of the
house. It was typically Southern in its architecture
and had an attractive air of repose and shadowed cool-
ness; but it was a hastily-built structure set on wooden
blocks and was flimsy and dilapidated. About dusk
the cattle came drifting in from the prairie; and the
grove outside of the hotel yard was their favorite stop-
ping place for the night in company with the razor-
backs and wandering ponies. There was a good deal
of lowing and grunting and whinnying and stamping
around before the creatures settled down. Moreover,
the town dogs had a habit of giving an evening concert,
and soon after midnight the roosters would begin to
crow their lusty challenges and kept up an intermittent
chorus until daybreak. But the most insistent sound
was the rumble of the pumps and drills off on the
oil-field — a noise resembling the distant roar of a giant
waterfall.

The bulk of the oil-field belongs to a single big com-
pany which bought the old health resort. Its wells are

8o Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

scattered through the woodland at quite a distance
from each other so that one well does not take oil from
territory another might drain. Just outside of this
property, clinging along its edges, are the independent
operators with derricks set almost as thick as they can
stand.

Most of the early comers who found oil made money,
but unless they later got into a large well-organized
company, or left the field satisfied with a moderate for-
tune they lost what they had previously gained. " When
you are once in this business," one pioneer oil man said
to me, "it's a blame hard thing to quit, you betcher!
As soon as oil was discovered here I come, and I come
a-whoopin'. I bought oil land for ninteen hundred
dollars that I sold for seventy-five thousand. Yes sir, but
I haven't got that money now. I tell you, there's four
dollars dropped to one that's picked up in this business.
We've got plenty of good oil land here not yet included
in what's being worked, and there's men who put in all
their time wandering around trying to locate it — oil
smellers, we call 'em. Every one of 'em has his own
methods and looks for the signs that he thinks are
sure. But the wildcat wells are seldom successful. The
lack of results from them is very apt to be charged to
the Standard Oil Company or some of the concerns
related to it. The prospectors think their drillers are
bribed by the big companies to go right through the oil
strata, and it is a fact that a whole lot of drillers are no

A Texas Bubble 8i

better than United States senators. They walk around
with one hand behind them and take money on the
side. But of course you can't always sometimes tell.
I've seen a well yielding seven thousand barrels a day,
and right adjoining it another was drilled which didn't
seem as if it could miss being a big producer, and yet
the second well got nothing but salt water."

Sour Lake itself has been preserved and is a grassy
scum-covered pond with park-like surroundings, and
with the old medicinal springs still in existence along
its borders. People continue to drink the waters, though
they do not come thither in such numbers as formerly.

As to the future of the Beaumont oil-field there is
some uncertainty. I met persons who believed that it
would rapidly be exhausted, and others who thought it
would continue productive for an indefinite period;
but the time when the industry here was a bubble,
irridescent with the promise of untold riches to the in-
vestor, is gone, and fortunes no longer are recklessly
wasted in trying to realize those unsubstantial dreams
of wealth.

Texas Notes. — ^Texas, the largest state in the union, includes a great
lumber region in the eastern part, and, more westerly, wheat and corn lands
and extensive prairie, while on the borders of New Mexico are high treeless
deserts. The Comanche and Apache Indians, who were among the most
warlike of the aborigines, were long the terror of the border settlements
and hindered the progress of the country. After France ceded Louisiana
to the United States, Texas was for a long time disputed territory, claimed by
both the United States and Spain, and not a little blood was shed in the

82 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

rivalry. In 1835, under the leadership of Sam Houston, the Mexicans were
driven out and Texas became an independent republic. Ten years later it
was annexed to the United States. This angered the Mexicans, who had
never acknowledged its independence, and the Mexican War resulted.

Austin, the capital, was founded in 1820 by Moses Austin, an American
who received a large grant of Texas lands from the Mexican government.
The settlement increased rapidly, but the settlers were of so lawless a
character that in 1830 the Mexican government forbade any more Americans
coming into Texas. The capitol at Austin is the largest in the country
except the one at Washington.

Galveston ranks foremost in commercial importance among Texas cities.
The first settlement there was made in 1815 by Lafitte, a noted Gulf pirate,
but it was broken up a few years later. In the hurricane of Sept. 8, 1900,
the city was almost entirely destroyed by a tidal wave that directly or in-
directly cost the lives of about 7,000 people. But the city has been rebuilt,
and a great future seems assured. On the outer side of the island it occupies
an immense sea-wall has been constructed to prevent the recurrence of such
a catastrophe. This sea-wall is three and one-half miles long, 17 feet high,
16 feet wide at the base, S feet wide at the top, and is made of crushed granite
sand and cement. It rests on a foundation of piles driven 44 feet deep.
There is a promenade on the top of the wall, and on its shoreward side is a
spacious boulevard and driveway. The general level of the city, which
formerly was little above that of the bay, has been raised ten feet. On the
seaward side of the wall is a splendid beach, smooth and hard, and 30 miles
long. This affords excellent motoring, driving, and walking.

Beaumont, down in the south-east corner of the state, is chiefly interesting
because of its romantic past. Sour Lake, which rivalled Beaumont in flood-
ing the region with oil, has a quaint woodland setting that adds much to
its interest.

Automobiling in Texas is far from ideal except in limited localities. The
only important route across the state starts at Little Rock, Kansas, passes
through Dallas and Fort Worth and El Paso, and continues to Tucson and
Phoenix in Arizona.

V

ON THE BANKS OF THE RIO GRANDE

THE river which is the boundary Una for more than
a thousand miles between the United States and
Mexico has a name unusually impressive and
charming to the imagination; and one naturally infers
that the stream is big and beautiful, flowing amid superb
scenery. I suppose we should not expect the character
of the actual river to come up to this ideal; but I was
to see it first at Eagle Pass — and the name of the Pass
like the name of the river fostered the feeling that there,
at least, the setting of the stream would be notably
romantic. What I really found was a wide channel,
with bordering clay bluffs that in places rose to an im-
posing height. The water did not at that season fill the
channel, which, on one side or the other, was often in
part occupied by broad, brushy levels, and shelving
stone-strewn beaches. The stream was brown with
mud, and ran seaward in swift shallows. Yet the vol-
ume of water was considerable, and when the river is in
flood it is a tremendous torrent. Nevertheless, except
for a few miles at the mouth, the stream is not put to
any use as a waterway. At Eagle Pass I did not even
see a rowboat on it, though twenty thousand people
live on its banks in the immediate vicinity.

84 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

The town on the American side is a rather straggling
trading center, with a number of large stores, banks and
hotels scattered along its chief street. Most of the other
structures consist of a medley of little Mexican shops
and dwellings that vary from substantial comfort to
the most meager discomfort. The houses were often
quite attractive, even when very humble. They usu-
ally had walls of stone or adobe, smoothly cemented
and whitewashed, and vines and blossoming shrubbery
grew about them. Many of the older houses were
roofed with thatch and resembled the peasant cottages
of Europe. Grass suitable for thatch is, however, be-
coming scarce. It used to grow abundantly in the bogs
and along the streams, but it has been killed by the
browsing of the cattle and by repeated cutting. A new
roof on the better houses is now apt to be of shingles,
and, on the poorer houses, of boards. Indeed, the huts
of the humbler inhabitants recently built are as a rule
wholly of boards, and are thoroughly ugly.

Another type of housewalls is made by setting up
studding to which slender limbs of mesquite are nailed
like lath. The space between is filled with flat stones
and the lath are plastered over with clay. If the clay
later begins to drop off it is an easy matter to dab on
some more. But the Mexicans are not very thrifty in
making seasonable repairs, and they often wait till
some of the cross-sticks loosen and let all the stones
come sliding out. Then, perhaps, instead of restoring

Filling a cask

On the Banks of the Rio Grande 85

the wall, they put up a makeshift barrier of rushes or
canes or old tin, and that may serve for months and
possibly years.

Many of the oldest buildings had the appearance,
as seen from the outside, of being roofless, but in reality
the roofs were of cement, nearly flat, and the drainage
was shot out over the sidewalk by a series of wooden
spouts projecting through the front wall. Glass win-
dows are a luxury, and the poorer families get along
with little unglazed openings that can be closed with a
board shutter. Often the upper panels of the doors are
made to open for ventilation. The windows have grat-
ings of iron, primarily designed to exclude intruders,
but which formerly served also to keep the young men
and young women apart. Intimate association between
the sexes, after the children reached their teens, was
thought undesirable. So the girls were obliged to spend
most of their time indoors, and went out only when
properly escorted. The boys, however, could roam the
streets freely, and if a lad had a fancy for a particular
girl he watched for an opportunity to talk with her
through the barred window.

At Eagle Pass, as in all other villages along the Rio
Grande, the whites constitute most of the mercantile
class, but the bulk of the people are Mexicans. It is
the Mexican language one hears most frequently on
the streets and in the stores, and the majority of those
who speak it are unable to use English at all. As a

86 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

class they are poor and illiterate and lack the faculty of
saving and rising to a higher plane of wealth and living
than the one to which they are born. This is especially
true on the south side of the river, where a system of
peonage keeps the laborer always indebted to his em-
ployer; and the law does not allow him to move away
while his debt is uncancelled. He is forever climbing
a hill and never getting to the top, and his children take
up the burden after him. Perhaps in desperation he
runs away and escapes across the border. Then he
gets work, and all the money he can spare from his
wages is sent back to Mexico until he has paid off his
debt; for he could not safely return while any of it was
unsettled. His energies are next bent to saving enough
to pay the debts of his relatives and bring them across
the river. If they attempted to get away by stealth and
were caught they would be thrown into prison.

The Mexicans are used to heavy, prolonged work,
and are sinewy and active. But they have little
initiative, need oversight, are slow to adapt themselves
to circumstances, and lack a vigorous courage. Em-
ployers very much prefer those newly across the line.
A recent arrival, when he speaks to you, pulls off his
hat and holds it under his arm, and his humility and
readiness to do faithfully whatever task is allotted to
him are points in his favor. After he learns English he
is often turned away, because, "He knows too much.

On the Banks of the Rio Grande 87

begins to think he is the boss instead of you, will not
work so hard as formerly, and, in general, is less
reliable."

It is not the habit for the women to work in the fields.
Ordinarily they stay about their homes, cook the food,
look after the chickens and take care of the garden if
they have one. Among the lowest class it sometimes
happens that a wife supports her husband in idleness
by taking in washing.

The poorer families at Eagle Pass do not have con-
nection with the city water system, but buy what they
need at ten cents a barrel of peddlers who drive through
the streets with a great cask mounted on two wheels
that is drawn by a donkey. Some peddlers go to the
river for the water, and others purchase it at a small
price from the city.

In my rambles about the region I usually had the
company of a very intelligent Mexican who could speak
both his native and the English language; and he took
me into quite a number of houses that I might under-
stand more clearly how the people lived. The dwellings
were rarely as spacious as the size of the families seemed
to demand, and it was necessary to have a bed in the
living-room. The better homes were neat and orderly,
and the walls were adorned with enlarged portraits and
gaudy-colored religious scenes. In the poorer houses
there was only one room, with a shed-like kitchen
attached. The floor was the hard-trodden earth, and

88 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

the space above was open to the roof. Such interiors
were gloomy and cavernous and smoke-blackened.
Usually there was a wide-mouthed fireplace, but if the
chimney happened to be out of order a few stones were
set up on the floor. On these stones a pot could be
set with a fire underneath, and the smoke curled up
toward the rafters and escaped through some window,
or through crevices in the walls and roof. Often a home
contains only one bed, and most of the family sleep on
the floor. Occasionally a family had a pig, which was
tied near the back door. If the pig was small, the
cord was passed in a criss-cross fashion over its
shoulders and back. If large, the creature was tied by
a hind leg.

Several dogs were sure to be members of the house-
hold, and at one dilapidated hut where I called there
were eight. A local American assured me that a Mex-
ican felt bound to keep more dogs than he had children,
and to feed them more, also. The hairless variety
seemed to be especially numerous, and Antonio, my
guide, accounted for this by saying: "People have a
belief that sleeping with those kind of dogs will cure the
rheumatism. But that's the only good thing there is
about them. You can't touch one without its biting at
you, or running away like a wild cow. These people
like dogs, and are always ready to accept the present of
a puppy, no matter what kind it is. The dogs sleep
most of the day, and at night spend their time outdoors

On the Banks of the Rio Grande 89

barking at each other and the river. If an officer is or-
dered to go and shoot a dog that is sick or has bitten
someone, the owners make him all the trouble they can.
You'd think they were protecting one of their children.

"I do not care for dogs myself. It is the American
fashion in the cities for a young lady to carry a dog in
her arms. But no matter how sweet would be the girl,
if she did that, I would have no use for her."

One of the staple articles of food in the Mexican
homes is the tortilla. This is a kind of corncake that
every family has at noon, and that many indulge in
three times a day. To make tortillas the corn is first
boiled with a little lime to remove the hull. Then it is
thoroughly washed and put on a slightly hollowed slab
of stone a foot wide and two feet long. On this the corn
is crushed with a stone pestle held flat and rubbed back
and forth. Presently water is added and the rubbing
continues till the meal becomes dough. Then, a small
piece at a time, it is spatted between the palms into thin
cakes the size of a large saucer. These are baked
quickly over the fire on a simple piece of sheet iron, and
are eaten with an accompaniment of beans and meat
and vegetables. The family perhaps has no table, and
a box serves instead; and some sit on other boxes and
some on the floor. Knives and forks are useless lux-
uries. The eater takes in each hand a tortilla doubled
to form a scoop and by bringing them together in the
stew, ar whatever it is he has before him, captures a

90 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

portion which he conveys to his mouth with one of the
tortillas. At the same time he bites off the end of the
improvised spoon. Thus he keeps dipping and biting
till at length he pitches what is left of the tortillas to the
dogs who have gathered close around with ears erect
waiting for their share. Then perhaps the dinner will
be enlivened by a dispute between two of the dogs or
between a dog and a cat. Sometimes the tortillas are
eaten with a little lard and salt. Butter is never seen in
the ordinary Mexican home. Coffee is the principal
drink, but the poor substitute a tea made from pepper-
mint, which they pick and dry themselves.

A field laborer gets up at daybreak, drinks some
coffee, and goes off to work. About eight o'clock his
wife or one of the children carries his breakfast to him.
If the weather is warm he stops at eleven and goes
home, and after the noon meal the whole family lie
down for a siesta. The man probably reclines outside
in the shade on a bench or the ground, or possibly in a
hammock made of sacks. The woman's place is on
the floor, just inside of the door where she gets the bene-
fit of any breeze that blows. About three or four o'clock
the siesta is over, and the man drinks a cup of coffee
and resumes work. He continues at his task until dark.
After he comes home he talks with his wife a while, has
supper, and in the course of an hour or two goes to bed.
The children have retired earUer, though they are often
allowed to run the streets until quite late.

On the Banks of the Rio Grande 91

" But that is not good for them," said Antonio, " and
I have my boy come in early when I am at home. If I
am away he stays out, because my wife cannot make
him come in with all her yells. He is the only child I
have now. Just a few weeks ago it was I lost my little
girl, three and a half years old. I think I liked her
better than my boy — and I like him all right. She had
learned to pray already; and every time I came home
she'd run and hug and kiss me. Yes, I think baby girls
are the real happiness of a family."

Antonio rolled a cigaret and puffed at it in melan-
choly reverie. I called his attention to an old woman
not far away at the door of a hut. She also was puffing
a cigaret. He said this was by no means an uncommon
feminine habit, and that the men had to have their
cigarets as a matter of course. "I began to smoke,"
said he, "at the age of four. My mother was dead, and
my daddy let me have anything I wanted to keep me
quiet. But most boys don't begin till they are eight or
ten."

Along the Rio Grande fifty cents a day is the usual
wage of a Mexican laborer; yet by going a hundred
miles or so to the north he can get a job herding sheep
among the mountains at thirty dollars a month and his
keep. He stays six months or more, and then, with
about two hundred dollars, starts for home. It may be
that at the first town he strikes he tries his hand at

92 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

gambling, and gets drunk. In such a case, the chances
are that he is robbed and has to turn back to his lonely
employment in the rugged uplands.

If, however, he escapes the allurements of the towns
and reaches the home hut, he turns his money over to
one of the women of the household — preferably the
eldest. There may be a man in the family as old as the
oldest woman; but the sheep herder would not think
of making him the guardian of the treasure, for the old
man might be tempted to spend it. With the old woman
it is perfectly safe. She is from habit very close and
economical, and she doles the money out a little at a
time. Her bed is the hiding-place for the money, and
one would think thieves might steal it. But some of the
family are always about the house during the daytime;
and at night not only are they all there, but the dogs
and other domestic creatures besides, so that the
disturbance created by an intruder would scare him out
of his wits.

When the last of the money has been spent the man
departs to the wilderness for another long period to
accumulate the wherewithal to again return to home
idleness. The living expenses of a family are not very
great. Such foods as they use are cheap, and they get
along with an extremely scanty supply of clothing.
Laborers wear sandals, and the children go barefoot
much of the time. There are only a few really sharp
days, even in winter, and some of the poorer boys get
along without any shoes at all.

Housewives at their washing

On the Banks of the Rio Grande 93

The biggest structure in the town on the Mexican
side of the river is a bull-ring, where every few weeks a
crowd gathers to witness a bull-fight. Sunday mornings
are comparatively sacred, and most of the women and
children attend mass. Quite a number of the young
men are also at church, perhaps attracted by the pres-
ence of the young women; but the older men who go
are few. Instead, you find many of them watching a
cock-fight which is a regular Sunday morning feature
in the Mexican town, and much of their hard-earned
money changes hands in the betting. If there is a bull-
fight later in the day they resort thither, where they are
joined by a numerous concourse of those who have been
to church. Antonio regarded bull-fighting as a superla-
tive sport. He said it was very seldom a man was seri-
ously injured, and those darts that were stuck into the
creatures did not hurt much; and as for the killing of
the bull at the last that was quickly over.

Gambling is another favorite Mexican recreation.
The game is usually for small sums, and to play half an
hour for a stake of twenty-five cents is quite usual.
But though as a rule they do not play as rashly as Amer-
ican gamblers, yet a well-to-do Mexican will sometimes
risk considerable amounts. If he loses, his relatives
look on it as an accident of fate, and they will often all
contribute to restore to him the amount he squandered.

The Mexicans have two Independence Days to cele-
brate, and our Fourth of July makes still another for

94 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

the dwellers on the north bank of the river. Freedom
from Spanish oppression was won in 1810 and is com-
memorated on Sept. 1 6th; and the escape from the
yoke of France in 1862 is celebrated on the fifth of May.
There are fireworks and noise and music, and in the
Mexican town they have a parade late in the afternoon,
and finally all the people gather for an evening prom-
enade on the plaza.

A very interesting phase of Mexican life is found in
the wedding customs. When a young man and young
woman have concluded that they want to marry, formal
application must be made to the girl's parents. This
falls to the lot of the boy's father, who writes a letter, or
if he cannot write, the lad or someone else writes in his
name, substantially as follows:

" Being that your daughter is a worthy girl, my son
has come to me and tells me that he wishes to marry
her, and I, discharging the duty of a father according
to the laws of our church, and also to comply with the
rules of good society, write to ask that your daughter
may unite in matrimony with my son. She has the
qualities that will make any man happy, and I hope to
have a favorable answer from you."

The missive is inclosed in a big, ofiicial-looking en-
velope, and then wrapped in a white silk handkerchief
which is a present to the girl. With this letter in their
charge the parents of the young man make an evening
call on the parents of the young woman. But they do

On the Banks of the Rio Grande 95

not discuss the subject about which they are most con-
cerned. When they are leaving they hand over the
letter and say they will call for an answer in a week or
two. If the girl's parents do not favor the match they
talk her out of it and write a negative reply. But if
everything is all right they say the wedding can be
celebrated as soon as convenient.

When the young man has been in due form accepted
he is supposed to begin at once to support his bride,
though she continues to live with her parents. Perhaps
he gives so much a day in money, or, if very poor, takes
to her the necessities for her subsistence. He might
even turn over to her all his cash and portable belong-
ings, confiding in her prudence to have most of them
left for their mutual use when they start housekeeping.
Hitherto the couple have had scarcely any opportunity
to talk privately together, but now they see each other
as often as they please. If there is only one room in the
bride's house her relatives go visiting at the neighbor's
when the young man calls. "So the two are quite
happy," as Antonio said, "until they are married, and
then their troubles begin."

If the girl belongs to a family that is "pretty well
fixed " she has three dresses for the wedding night. At
the church ceremony she is in full white. After she
returns to the house she dons a dress of a sky blue tint
or other delicate color, and in this dances till midnight.
Then she puts on red. The ball continues till daylight,

96 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

when the revelers depart, and the bride and groom go
to the house where they intend to live.

The people are superstitious and are great believers
in witchcraft. " I knew of a woman who was sick here,"
said Antonio, "and they took a right black chicken,
killed it, and soaked it in kerosene, put on some chile
powder, and then burned it, feathers and all, on the
floor. Of course there was a strong smoke, and they
held the sick woman so her head was in it and she'd
breathe as much as possible. But she didn't get well."

A death is at once made known through the crying
and wailing that proceed from the home of the bereaved,
and the house is soon full of neighbors, who continue to
stay about in strong force until after the funeral. Whis-
key is furnished by the afflicted family, and the occa-
sion is more jovial than serious to most of the crowd.

An excursion which I made from Eagle Pass, and
recall with special pleasure, was to a rustic village on
the Mexican side of the river. Antonio went with me,
and we walked. At first the dusty roadway kept to the
depths of a hollow through a monotonous wood of mes-
quite where the mocking birds warbled, and the red-
birds whistled. Later we emerged onto stony hills
dotted with sagebrush and big thorny clumps of cactus.
Here we met a flock of two or three hundred milch
goats grazing along in the care of a medieval looking
shepherd. Another mile brought us to a spot where we
overlooked a luscious, wooded valley with a little river

On the Banks of the Rio Grande 97

winding through it, and we could see cultivated lands
and adobe houses. When we descended to the river we
found by the shore many groups of washerwomen.
There they knelt scrubbing away, some with a wide
board slanting into the swift current, others using a
shallow, partly submerged box. They had soap, and
they had fires to heat water, and the children ran about
wading and paddling. It was quite idyllic.

At several spots were fords, where the teams and
horseback riders waded through, and we followed a
path in the rank grass and jungles of cane to find a
bridge farther up the stream. This bridge proved to
be only a narrow, precarious timber laid across, but we
got safely to the other side, and there Antonio stopped
to get a drink. He said the water was not bad, but
there were washerwomen above as well as below, and
it looked too soapy to tempt me.

The village was an odd, half-ruinous hamlet, and
the home premises were separated from the highway
by walks of adobe, or fences of cane. At one house
into which I looked was a man sitting on the floor mak-
ing bird-cages, and he had numerous gay feathered
captives all about the apartment and the yard. He was
a handsome, alert, bright-eyed fellow who made bird-
catching his business. In the village gardens grew figs
and peaches and grapes, and great wide-spreading pecan
trees flourished along the stream. All things indeed

98 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

appeared so green and flourishing that it seemed as if
even poverty in such surroundings must hold a good
deal of happiness.

Note. — ^Anyone journeying through Texas toward Mexico or the
far southwest should stop at San Antonio. It has a marked attraction
in its delightful climate, and, though thriving and modem in most
ways, is not without certain interesting Mexican traits and features.
No other Texan town can rival the part it has played in the state's
history, and its age is attested by several old Spanish Missions that
survive in the vicinity. They belong to a remote past that now seems
but a dream. One of these old mission churches, the Alamo, fronting
on a plaza of the same name in the heart of the city, has perhaps the
most tragic fascination of any building in this country; for here in
1836 a beleaguered band of one hundred and eighty Americans met
an untimely death at the hands of the Mexicans. Texas had been a
part of Mexico, but had recently revolted and proclaimed itself an
independent republic. This action aroused great enthusiasm in the
United States, and many went to aid the Texans in their struggle for
liberty. Among these was Davy Crockett, the most famous rifle-shot
of his day, and such a successful hunter that his skill was proverbial.
He came to San Antonio and joined a little band of other Americans
who had fortified themselves in the Alamo. About the same time
Santa Anna, the dictator of Mexico, arrived with an army of four
thousand men and laid siege to the ancient thick-walled mission build-
ing. Day after day the defenders withstood the attacking host, but
at last breaches were made in the outer defences through which the
Mexicans made a successful charge. The frontiersmen then retreated
to the inner building where a desperate hand to hand conflict ensued.
After the Americans had fired their long rifles, they used them as clubs,
and fought with their knives and revolvers. The unequal contest
reeled to and fro between the shattered walls until gradually the de-
fenders were all killed. Crockett was one of the last to fall. Wounded,
and ringed around by the bodies of the men he had slain, he continued

On the Banks of the Rio Grande 99

to face the foe with his back to the wall. Then he, too, was shot down, and
the fight was soon over.

But as the story of the combat spread, more and more Americans flocked
to the aid of the Texans until they had a force of eleven hundred men. Then
they assailed the Mexican army with the cry, "Remember the Alamo,"
and won an overwhelming victory that secured the independence of the
frontier republic.

The church seems to have derived its name from being built in a grove of
alamo, or Cottonwood trees. Within six miles of the city are four other old
missions. San Antonio was settled by the Spanish about 1690. One hundred
and fifty miles southeast of San Antonio is Corpus Christi, a famous pleasure
resort for tourists, fishermen, and health-seekers. It is on a beautiful bay,
has a delightful climate, and claims to be unequalled the world over for
sea-bathing, fishing, and boating.

To see the Rio Grande a few days can be spent very satisfactorily at Eagle
Pass, or at El Paso. Just across the river from each place is an old Mexican
town where the quaint homes, costumes, and manners of the people are
very different from those of our own land.

VI

PUEBLO LIFE IN NEW MEXICO

MUCH of New Mexico seems to the casual ob-
server a half-naked and stony wilderness where
only the scantiest population can ever find
subsistence. But there is a vast amount of good land
that only needs irrigation to make it productive and
beautiful; and by utilizing the streams fully and get-
ting artesian water from below the surface the aspect of
the region may be changed materially. By the time
this possibility is realized to any marked extent the
pueblo life now characteristic of a large portion of the
country will be a memory of the past. Even as things
are the picturesque conditions that make the Pueblo
Indians and their villages so interesting are giving way
to the white man's civilization, and their homes and
habits are fast being modified.

Several of the pueblos are right on the line of the rail-
road. Of these, Laguna is perhaps best worth seeing,
and moreover it is the point of departure for visiting
Acoma, which in situation and in primitiveness is the
most fascinating pueblo in all the Southwest. I made
the fifteen mile journey from Laguna to Acoma in a

Pueblo Life in New Mexico lOi

light farm wagon accompanied by an Indian who
served both as guide and driver. According to this
Indian the road was a very good one; but I concluded
he meant in comparison with others in the region.
Sometimes we dragged slowly along through sand ruts,
sometimes bumped over a rough shoulder of rock, and
there were sudden gullies and steep hills, and stretches
of hardened clay full of wheel tracks and hoof prints.

The scenery was rather forbidding. All about, at
frequent intervals, rose the mesas with their flat tops
and their sides strewn with boulders that had fallen
from above. Some of them were mere hills, others
mountainous in size and height. The half-barren land
between was dotted with bushy cedars, very thick-
stemmed at the ground, but soon tapering off, and
always dwarfed in stature. At last we descended into
a big level valley that looked like the floor of some old
lake. It was thinly grassed, and numerous flocks of
. sheep, horses and cattle were grazing on it. Each flock
of sheep included a number of black ones, and still
more variety was added by the presence of several
goats, which are valued not only for their milk, but as a
protection to the sheep from wild animals. The coyotes
follow the flocks of sheep very persistently, and the old
goats stand guard, and fight the enemy, if necessary.

On ahead of us we could now see what is known as
"The Enchanted Mesa," a vast castle-like rock rising
with perpendicular walls from the floor of the plain to

I02 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

a height of four hundred and thirty feet. Its great size
and ragged crags make it one of the most impressive
natural wonders on the continent. Higher and higher
it loomed as we drew nearer, and its name and the
strange legends that have been told about it seemed
quite in keeping with its peculiar character. According
to one of the legends the pueblo of Acoma formerly
occupied this height, and the path by which the people
went up and down followed a crevice where a huge por-
tion of the face of the precipice had partially separated
from the main mass. One day, while all of the inhabi-
tants except three sick women were at work in the
fields on the plain below, there came a sudden storm,
and the deluge of rain, or the lightning, sent the leaning
ledge crashing down to the base of the mesa. The path
was destroyed, and the three sick women perished be-
yond reach of aid on the then inaccessible cliff, and the
rest of the community sought a new place for their
village.

Several exploring parties in recent years have been to
the summit of the great rock. The first of these, led by
an Eastern college professor, laid siege to the mesa with
a mortar and a number of miles of assorted ropes, sup-
plemented by pulleys, a boatswain's chair and a pair
of horses. Later parties have scaled the height aided
only by a half dozen lengths of six foot ladders. They
scrambled up a considerable portion of the distance
over the loose stones at the sides of the precipice, and

Pueblo Life in New Mexico 103

went still father up a narrow gorge. Presently the lad-
ders became necessary, but only in one or two places
did they have to put all six together. Nevertheless, the
ascent was arduous, and at the steepest points somewhat
perilous.

On top is an area of twelve acres that is almost bare
rock. The explorers find there bits of broken pottery,
stone axes and arrowheads, and ornaments made of
wild hogs' tusks. The only indication of buildings is a
regular arrangement of loose stones which evidently
were the foundation of a round room. That the mesa
was ever the site of a pueblo seems doubtful. More
likely it was used simply as a place of refuge for small
parties cut off from retreat to the main village by
marauding enemies.

Three miles beyond, at the end of the valley on an-
other wild mesa, is the pueblo of Acoma, a place of
about half a thousand inhabitants. There it has been
for seven hundred years, probably presenting from the
beginning almost the identical appearance it does today.
From a distance you would think the long continuous
lines of adobe walls were a part of the mesa itself rising
to a slightly greater height, but as you draw nearer you
see occasional little chimneys and windows. The lofty
table rock on which it stands is scarcely less romantic
than the Enchanted Mesa, and the savage crags seem
to have been carved by thunderbolts.

104 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

At first sight no way presents itself of climbing the
precipitous sides; yet the Indians have no less than ten
trails up different crevices, two of which are practical
for horses. We, however, stopped with our team at
one side of the mesa, where rose, here and there, isolated
brown pillars and ledges — ^gigantic statues of nature's
own making. About the base of them were rude cedar
fences and a few hovels where the Indians kept their
milch animals at night. Beside one of these corral
clusters we unhitched our horses and put them in a hut.
Then we ascended a sand drift that rose far up against
the cliff; and when that ended clambered on up a nar-
row crevice which twisted this way and that, and some-
times passed over a strewing of boulders and sometimes
beneath one lodged between the walls of the ravine.
Steps had been rudely chipped out at the steepest points,
and little pocket-like holes made in the adjoining cliff
to grip with the hand.

The top of the mesa is a gentle slope of solid rock
with a somewhat irregular surface. In two or three
places are deep hollows where the rain water collects in
little ponds, and this is the town's source of supply for
drinking, cooking and washing. The water looked
rather dubious, but I was assured that impurities set-
tled to the bottom and left it clean and palatable.

A church and three parallel lines of homes consti-
tute the village. Each series of homes rises in several
terraces, and the ascent to the top of the first terrace is

Pueblo Life in New Mexico 105

made by great rough outside ladders. To climb to the
upper terraces, however, a few stone steps often do ser-
vice. The original purpose of this type of architecture
was protection against enemies; for the first story was
without doors or windows, and when the ladders were
drawn up the pueblos were safe from the assaults of
their rudely armed, savage neighbors.

The walls are of stone laid in mud, and are daubed
over smooth with mud inside, and frequently outside
also. In constructing the roofs pine is used for the
large beams, and across these cedar poles are laid close
together. Next comes a layer of rushes and grass and
the spiny leaves of the yucca. Then clay mud mixed
with broken bits of wheat straw is put on. In a pro-
longed dry spell the roof is apt to crack, and unless the
cracks are mended the rain soaks through and trickles
down on the floor where it muddies up everything.
Sheets of crystal gypsum serve for windows, the
largest of which are about twelve by eighteen inches.
They are windows of a single pane set solidly in an
aperture of the wall.

The dwellings have from two to eight rooms, includ-
ing such as are used for storage, and these are not nearly
as gloomy as one might expect, for they are kept thor-
oughly whitewashed. One of the largest apartments is
the living-room. It is warmed by a fireplace — ^not a
very economical method of heating, perhaps; but the
walls are so thick, and there is such lack of ventilation

io6 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

that a little fuel goes a long way. Wood is plentiful on
the rough lands around, and the Indians can get all
they want for the trouble of cutting and drawing it, or
carrying it on their backs as they sometimes do. Scrub
cedar is used chiefly, because that is most accessible;
but pine is preferred when it can be had, for it burns
with almost no smoke.

Across one end of the living-room a long pole is sus-
pended from the rafters by thongs of rawhide. On this
is hung all the extra clothing, blankets, belts, and some
tanned buckskin not yet made into garments. Certain
family heirlooms in the form of necklaces are likewise
hung on the pole where they will attract the admiration
of visitors. Some of these are very old and are made of
fragments of seashells and black and cream colored
stones shaped into beads. The best of them are worth
fifteen or twenty horses.

A single sleeping apartment does for an entire family.
The beds are mattresses of wool laid on the floor. There
is never much circulation of air in the room, and if the
weather is cold it is shut up tight and the fireplace fur-
nishes the only ventilation. In warm weather, how-
ever, the Pueblo folk often sleep out on the terrace.

To descend to the lower rooms there is a trap-door
and ladders. Climb down, and you find corn stored in
a heap on the floor, and the wheat in big bins of plas-
tered stone. Here, too, is the same sort of truck that
white people usually relegate to the garret — broken

The ladders that give access to the upper stories

Pueblo Life in New Mexico 107

tools and furniture, discarded clothing and whatever
other useless things would be in the way in the upper
rooms.

The young people are inclined to adopt white ways
and to buy home conveniences that were formerly lack-
ing. For instance, probably half the families now have
tables; but it used to be the universal habit to eat on
the floor, seated on a few little stools or blocks of wood,
or blankets, while the bowls, platters and other pottery
containing the food were distributed handily around.

The sanitary arrangements of the homes are not all
they might be; yet the women sweep out daily, and
there is an annual clean-up of the whole town when
refuse and filth are carted off, walls whitewashed, and
everything made as spick and span as the antique con-
ditions of the town will allow.

In clothing, the Indians are gradually donning the
garments of the whites, and so far as the men are con-
cerned the transformation has often been complete.
The elders of the tribe, however, still occasionally put on
blankets and colored turbans. Blanket wearing is the
rule with the women, but their gowns are of civilized
cloth, and shoes and stockings are replacing the moc-
casins and leg-windings of buckskin. These buckskin
leg-windings are supposed to have been devised as a
protection against snakes, and the present-day wearers
retain them as a matter of fashion. Yet, in summer,
they find the buckskin so uncomfortably warm that
they are apt to take it off and go barefoot.

io8 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

The people are peaceful and thrifty. Those Indian
tribes that roamed the mountains and plains have be-
come wards of the government, but the Pueblo Indians
have maintained a self-supporting integrity. They
irrigate in the valleys, and raise such staples as corn and
wheat, and a variety of garden vegetables, apples, plums
and other fruit.

One of the picturesque incidents of the harvest is the
wheat threshing. A level circle of ground is prepared
with a surface of clay that is wet slightly and beaten
and walked over till it is perfectly hard and smooth.
After inclosing it with a fence of cedar poles, all the
grain belonging to one farmer is arranged in the center
in a big loose pile, probably not less than six yards in
diameter, leaving about eight feet between it and the
fence. The threshing is accomplished by driving a dozen
or so horses around the circuit, beginning about nine
in the morning. A squad of men and boys is on hand,
armed with whips to chase the horses, and the central
pile gradually works down so that all the ears are trodden
out. By twelve o'clock the threshing is done, and in
the afternoon the straw is thrown into a pile outside of
the fence, and the wheat cleaned up and everything
made ready for threshing the next man's crop on the
morrow. The grain is separated from the chafF some
windy day by throwing it up in the air with wooden
shovels.

Pueblo Life in New Mexico 109

Dogs and poultry abound in the village; for every
family keeps about a dozen fowls and very likely half
that number of dogs. One may often meet an Indian
on horseback with three or four curs ranging along in
his wake. The Indians have great herds of sheep that
wander among the mesas the year through, and they
have many horses and cattle. Certain kinds of wild
grass in the Southwest cure on the stalk, and this hay
which nature furnishes, and nibblings of sagebrush and
cactus keep the creatures from perishing in the lean
months. The rainy season comes in July and August,
after which the grass flourishes and there is abundance
of feed through the fall. The only creatures that are
provided with winter shelter are the horses and such
cows and goats as are milked. For the horses rude
stables are constructed, but the cows and goats get along
with corrals. Alfalfa and oats are raised to feed these
animals; and the corn fodder is saved and thrown up
on the stable roofs to keep the stock from devouring it
all at once or trampling it in the mire. The creatures
get but scanty fare at best and are sure to be decidedly
thin by spring. The sale of wool and of the sheep and
other creatures is the chief source of the Indians' in-
come. Something is added to this by the women who
make pottery and dispose of it at the railway stations to
travellers on the trains, or to traders; and a portion of
the men work for wages.

no Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

A good deal of the money that comes into their hands
is not spent wisely; but the same might be said of the
expenditures of any class the world over. They gamble
in a small way, buy candy and jewelry, cookstoves,
sewing-machines, and brass bedsteads, and make curi-
ous misfits in introducing modern articles into their
ancient homes and half savage habits of life.

Their amusements are more varied than the outsider
would suspect, and, in particular, they enjoy races, both
on foot and on horseback. One pecuhar contest of
speed and expertness consists in two rival parties going
in opposite directions and each kicking a stick about a
foot long and an inch in diameter over a course agreed
on. This course may be anywhere from five to twenty
miles long.

In the fall some day is fixed on for a rabbit hunt. The
young men, to the number of about a score, ride off on
horseback armed with clubs, which they hurl at every
rabbit they sight. Each rider is eager to outdo his com-
rades and get the largest number, and they have a wild
time chasing and heading off the rabbits. If fortune
favors they may secure an average of two or three apiece,
but on the other hand the whole crowd may kill only a
half dozen.

A hunt of a more serious sort, yet scarcely less en-
joyed, occurs in November, when three or four parties
with about ten in each go off some fifty miles in different
directions and camp and hunt deer.

The governor of the village

Pueblo Life in New Mexico in

For real fun, however, from the Indian viewpoint,
nothing quite equals a special race it is customary to
have on St. John's Day. The start is made on a level
piece of ground near the village, where a live rooster has
been buried in the sand all but its head. From fifteen
to thirty racers mount their horses, go back from the
rooster about two hundred yards, and at a signal put
their steeds into a run. As they dash past the rooster
each makes a grab at the bird until someone gets him.
Then on they go in a mad rush engaged in a lively con-
test to gain possession of the captive chanticleer. The
bird may change hands a number of times, and the
fellow who brings him back to the starting-point is the
victor.

After the harvest is finished dances are frequent until
spring. Many of these dances are religious and com-
memorate some old tradition, and the participants
dress up in all their barbaric glory. Other dances are
merely social. There is not much movement in them.
The dancers gather in a room and stand facing each
other, one or two rows of men on this side, and similar
rows of women on the other. Then they jump up and
down, with certain changes of step, keeping time to the
energetic music of drums and their own chanting.

One other pleasure that should be mentioned is the
nutting expeditions. There are great forests of pines
within twelve or fifteen miles, and thither the Indians
resort in the late autumn and erect their tents on the

112 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

mountain sides, a number of families grouped together,
mostly women and children. They pick up thousands
of bushels and have great sport. The nuts are nearly
all consumed in the months to come by the Indians
themselves. They like them best roasted, and evening
is the favorite time for eating them. It is customary to
set out the nuts when visitors happen in, and while those
present feast they gossip and perhaps repeat the ancient
folk tales of their race. They are great story-tellers,
and some of the old men — especially certain of the
numerous medicine men — are professionals in the art.
The stories are a mingling of fact and fiction. Some of
them have to do with long journeys and adventurous
hunting excursions. Others are narratives of fights
with the Navajos and of the deeds of the tribal heroes.
These heroes are still human in their attributes if they
lived within a generation or two, but before that they
are demigods.

In the presence of white men the Indians are usually
silent and undemonstrative, but among themselves they
carry on much lively chatter that is both loquacious and
humorous, and they will often stay up half the night
over their small talk.

The climate is favorable to health; and now that
the Indians are no longer swept off wholesale by small-
pox, every hardy child has a fair prospect of a long life.
Rheumatism, pneumonia, and diphtheria are perhaps the
most prevalent diseases. The people have a good deal

Pueblo Life in New Mexico 113

of faith in the curative properties of roots and herbs,
and when these fail call in a medicine man. The
physician tries to effect a cure by incantations; and he
may resort to breathing on the patient or will use his
eagle feathers to brush away the pain, or he will stroke
the sick person with a bear's claw, which is another
implement of his trade. Often his labors continue for
hours at a time. His reward is generally a present of
provisions or some article of clothing.

Each tribe has its governor and other officers, elected
annually. The voting is done at a public meeting where
the supporters of the rival candidates stand up in turn to
be counted. In the evening, after the election, there is
a big dance in some private house that has a large
dining-room. It lasts most of the night. Once a month
the council holds a session to transact public business
and settle quarrels. This is a daytime meeting, and
every official present receives a fee of fifty cents. Money
for needful expenses comes largely from fines for drunk-
enness or assaults, but once in a while a small assess-
ment is levied. Roads, bridges, fences, and irrigating
ditches are taken care of by each man contributing a
certain amount of labor on them yearly. All the land is
owned in common, but any family can have set off to it
as much as it will cultivate. If this land is allowed to
lie idle for three years it reverts to the pueblo.

When the first Spaniards invaded the region the
Pueblos seem to have accepted their rule and religion

114 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

without any very strenuous resistance. But in l68i a
plot was formed to throw off the yoke. A day was set
for the massacre of all Caucasians in the pueblo country.
Four hundred persons including soldiers, civilians, and
priests were killed, and the rest fled for their lives.
Churches were pillaged and torn down and mines filled
up. Three priests who were in Acoma at the time of
the outbreak were taken to a high point on the edge of
the mesa and compelled to jump. Two were thus
killed outright, but the gown of the third expanded into
a sort of parachute which broke the force of his fall and
saved him from injury. The Indians thought his escape
from death was due to heavenly intervention and they
gave him his liberty.

It soon happened that the leader of the revolt, intoxi-
cated by success, insisted on being paid divine honors.
Hero worship of this sort was not to the liking of the
rest of the Indians, and dissensions were a result. Be-
sides, the different tribes got to squabbling among
themselves. So in a dozen years the Spaniards had
reconquered the pueblos. Since then they have been
at peace with the whites, but have suffered much at the
hands of the Navajos and Apaches. They are naturally
peaceful, but they would fight hardily in defence of
their homes; and when they were on the walls of their
Gibraltar-like towns with their bows and arrows, lances
and war-clubs they were by no means to be despised.
Their savage foes, therefore, confined their efforts to
cutting off small parties and stealing sheep. Some-

An oven

Pueblo Life in New Mexico 115

times the Apaches would pick up a stray child. This
child was made a member of the captor's tribe, and a
good vigorous boy was always considered a welcome
addition to the tribal strength.

The Pueblo Indians gave our own government valu-
able help in its operations against the nomadic Navajos,
both in fighting and as scouts. Their natural capacity,
energy, and thrift place them decidedly above the aver-
age of red men, and their homes and ways of life are
strikingly original and interesting. This is especially
true of Acoma which stands on its rugged mesa just as
it has for centuries past, basking in the summer suns
and swept by the winter blasts, with that wild region
around of fantastic rocks, curiously eroded pillars and
great buttes.

Another place in New Mexico possessing a peculiar
attraction on account of its age is Sante Fe. It is the
second oldest town in the United States, and it con-
tains the oldest church and the oldest dwelling. These
two structures adjoin each other and are impressive in
their simplicity and evident antiquity. They are of
thick-walled adobe, as are many other buildings in the
town, which is as much Mexican as it is American in
appearance and manners. It lies in a vast semi-arid
basin with hills and lofty mountains at some distance.
Little irrigating ditches network the town and there are
luscious gardens and thriving trees. The inhabitants
number only a few thousand and the place has much

1 16 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

the character of a big lazy village. Its people like to
loiter on the shadowy, green-turfed plaza and on the
corridor-like sidewalks, across which the older buildings
have extended pillared porticos. There has apparently
never been any regular plan in the building of the city,
and the streets wind, and zigzag, and jerk around
corners in a most unexpected fashion. As a somewhat
garrulous visitor whom I fell in with remarked: "You
walk along and think you are going somewhere only to
find you are going somewhere else. Oh, it's jiggety
jog; but, by gracious! I like it."

The speaker was a gray old man who had been a
captain in the Civil War. Sante Fe's reputation as a
health resort had drawn him thither, and he was de-
lighted with its climate, its quaintness and the friendli-
ness of its inhabitants. He had a cheerful greeting for
everyone we met. Often he paused to shake hands
with this one or that — to sympathize with a sick man,
to pat a child on the head, to discuss history and re-
ligion with some priest.

"You couldn't use street cars here," he said in con-
tinuing his comments on the character of the town,
"unless they were made on an angle and a circle, be-
cause the streets are so crooked. Why, there isn't a
square corner in the city. You go along one street, and
you run right up ag'in' a house. You try another and
it takes you into a dooryard; and I was in one that
ended hke a wedge so I just had to turn around and
come back.

Pueblo Life in New Mexico 117

"See those little burros with the loads of wood on
their backs," said the captain pointing down the street
with his cane. "The wood is all cut up ready for the
stove, and the driver in charge peddles it from house to
house. Each burro carries about two wheelbarrow
loads, and they've come anywhere from five to twenty
miles. A man or boy follows behind and tickles them
up with a switch— any old way to get there.

" But those peddlers are making an honest living. I
recall back in Ohio a man who went around with a two-
horse covered wagon, and on the sides was painted in
big letters 'WHAT IS IT .? Admission 10 cents.' The
fellow lived in the wagon and drove from place to place
exhibiting an animal he had inside. You paid your
ten cents and went up some steps behind, and when you
saw the creature you'd say : 'Why, it looks like a ground-
hog,' and that's what it was — nothing but a dirty Oregon
ground-hog. And yet that man stirred up curiosity by
his sign, and people would climb into his wagon and
discuss and discuss what the animal really was. I sup-
pose if I was to attempt a thing like that the sheriff
would get me sure and put me in a lunatic asylum. But
tricks go all right with some men."

A wayside shrub attracted my companion's attention,
and he broke off a twig, which he showed to the next
man we met with a query as to its name. The man
replied rather gruffly that he didn't know what the
shrub was and didn't care.

ii8 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

"You don't live in this town, I guess," commented
the captain, and the man shook his head and walked on.

"I knew he didn't," the captain declared, "or he
wouldn't have answered a civil question like that.
They're a fine people here, polite and intelligent and
accommodating, and they have the best climate in the
world. Back in Ohio it's an old saying that we have
six months of winter and three months of late in the
fall every year. But here, even in winter, most of the
days are pleasant and comfortable. Then in summer,
though the thermometer goes up as high as one hundred
and twenty in the shade, they tell me it is a dry heat
that don't trouble a person. A man may perspire, and
a few drops fall from his face, but he don't get wringing
wet as he would in the East. It's healthy here. You
bet it is; and I never was anywhere that suited me
better."

So he went on in his own lively fashion expatiating on
the charms of the old town, and in his opinion it evi-
dently was not much inferior to the original Garden of
Eden.

New Mexico Notes. — In spite of its general aspect of arid and sun-
burned monotony, New Mexico has much to entice the traveller to pause
and observe it more in detail. It can be entered by automobile to advan-
tage from Colorado over the Raton Pass where the road has been built by
convict labor in such a way that the country can be viewed thence in the
clear mountain atmosphere for hundreds of miles. The first place of marked
interest is Las Vegas, which has won favor as a pleasure and health resort.

The old church at Santa Fe

Pueblo Life in New Mexico 1 19

Here are about 40 hot springs. The water is used both for bathing and
drinking, and mud baths are also to be had.

Seventy-five miles farther on is Santa Fe, the capital of the state, founded
by the Spaniards in 1605. It lies in the center of an important mining
district. On one side of the plaza, or public square, is the Governor's Palace,
a long, low structure of adobe, which has been the abode of the Spanish,
Mexican, and American governors for 300 years. In it General Lew Wallace,
while governor, wrote "Ben Hur." It contains a museum of old Spanish
paintings and historical relics. About nine miles northwest of Santa Fe
is the pueblo of the Tesuque Indians, who visit the city daily bringing fire-
wood on their burros.

There are more than a score of the many-chambered communal pueblos
in the state, and their inhabitants own nearly a million acres of land. Near
Albuquerque is the important pueblo of Isleta, and forty-eight miles west
by the motor highway is Laguna. Motorists will find the road thence to the
Enchanted Mesa and Acoma poor, and it is especially bad after rains owing
to the alkali mud. It is possible to visit the famous pueblo of Zuni by auto-
mobile, but the usual way is to go by railroad to Gallup and hire a team.
It is about forty miles distant to the south. Gallup is also the starting-point
for making a trip across the Painted Desert, seventy miles, to Chico, where
is the largest group of prehistoric stone houses in the Southwest. The high-
way crosses the continental divide on the western borders of New Mexico
at a height of nine thousand feet.

One of the charms of the state is its weather. The typical day is abso-
lutely cloudless, and the sun makes its journey across the vast blue dome of
the sky without the least film of mist to obscure its brightness, and there
are three hundred such days every year.

VII

AROUND pike's PEAK

A GOOD many people go to the top of the Peak on
foot," remarked a casual acquaintance soon after
I reached Colorado Springs, near the base of
the mountain; "but a person like you from the low-
lying Eastern States couldn't do it. You are not used to
high altitudes, and your breath would give out, and
you'd be so sick and faint you'd have to turn back."

What this man said proved to be my undoing, for I
felt that I must find out for myself whether he was right
or not. The mountain is a little over fourteen thousand
feet high, and rises eight thousand above the village of
Manitou where the climbing actually begins. There is
a cog-wheel railroad for persons who choose to journey
comfortably; and those otherwise minded usually
trudge along the tracks. I started at noon to make the
nine mile ascent. The trail at once became toilsomely
steep. It followed up a ravine amid thin pine woods,
and on the rocky slopes were many precariously-
balanced boulders of mammoth size apparently ready
to roll down and crush everything in their path. Quite
a number of these wayside boulders were made strangely

Around Pike's Peak I2i

incongruous by having religious mottoes painted on
them in big black letters. I suppose some pious indi-
vidual had done this for the public good, with the idea
that the surroundings would incline those who passed
up and down to serious thoughts. The execution was
rather rude, as will be seen by the following sample :

He That Blieveth
Shall B Saved

He Who Does

Not Shall B

Damned

Another ran in this wise — "Let the wicked forsake
his way;" but some wag had added a letter which
made it read, "Let the wicked forsake this way."

For the first two miles I had the constant company
of a mountain stream that made the air musical with
its rushing and leaping, but presently I left the ravine
and went on by a gentler grade across ragged upland
with here and there an expanse of bog, or a little lake.
When I approached the timber line the slant was again
sharply upward. From here I could look far off over
the neighboring giant heights and see the level prairie
to the east with the cloud shadows floating across its
illimitable expanse. Close about was the lonely wilder-
ness, almost silent, save for the soughing of the wind
through the dark evergreen foliage.

By this time I was extremely tired, the muscles I used
most were aching, and my heart was beating violently.

122 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

Besides that, I was panting for breath, and I had to
stop every little while to recuperate. Things became
worse as I went on, and I longed to turn back; but the
fact that I had been told I could not go to the top urged
me on. Now I passed beyond the last of the woodland
and was amid a waste of broken blocks of stone par-
tially hidden by snow. Sometimes, too, there was snow
in my path, which made the footing slippery and greatly
aggravated my troubles. I would totter on a few steps
and then stop, gasping and exhausted. If I sat down
I felt as though I never wanted to get up. The sky was
increasingly cloudy, and once or twice I was enveloped
in a filmy snowsquall. But in spite of the difficulties I
at length reached the top. In utter weariness I crouched
down near the low, stone summit house, and looked off
on the wide mystery of mountains and prairie, warmed
in places by the sunshine, and in other places blue with
the cold cloud shadows.

I did not care to loiter. It was five o'clock, night was
near, and I had that long descent to make. After a few
minutes I rose lamely and started, and at first the change
from climbing was a relief. I went along with hasty
strides, digging my heels into the snow, and was re-
joiced over my progress. But the air was becoming
decidedly chilly, the wind swept unhindered across the
bare slopes, and my hands grew stiff and numb. Sev-
eral times I had to pause and warm them, and affairs
did not improve until I reached the timber line. Then

A balanced rock in The Garden of the Gods

Around Pike's Peak 123

the route was less exposed and the air not so keen. My
steps were again lagging now, and I had to pause fre-
quently to give my aching muscles a little respite, and to
ease my toes, which rebelled at the incessant cramming
into the tips of my shoes. The evening gloom was by
this time so dense that I was constrained to step care-
fully, lest I should plunge down into some unexpected
depth. Nor could I help recalling that among the deni-
zens of the mountains were certain wild animals whom
it might not be pleasant to meet. Finally I was en-
couraged by the sight of lights in the hollow below, and
yet I was not quite certain but that these might be in
the infernal regions, I had descended so long. When I
dragged myself into the village it was with a vow that
I would never make such a climb again for the rest of
my days.

The vicinity of the Peak is famous as a summer
resort, and most of the mountain climbers go up in
warm weather. Pedestrians ordinarily start in the
evening, for during the day, the heat in the narrow
chasm which the route at first follows, and the glare of
the sun on the rocks make walking almost out of the
question. Most of those who start do not realize what
they are undertaking. In the clear Colorado air the
mountain top looks much nearer than it really is, and
the walker begins his climb with brisk cheerfulness;
but by the time he attains his goal he is ready to swear
that the mountain is ten miles high. The warmth in the

124 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

valley is uncomfoitable; and yet at the summit the
thermometer goes down nearly to zero every night. So
each climber carries a blanket and a supply of coats
and sweaters. A crowd starts out each evening. They
are all happy and friendly, and the various groups
will be stopping here and there along the way to build
fires and make coffee.

"Everything goes pretty well," said one informant,
" till you get to the timber line. Just beyond is what is
called Windy Point, where a breeze is always blowing,
and it is so cold you are chilled right through, no matter
how much clothing you put on. Lots of people, when
they get that far, hunt up a spot where they can escape
from the gale, and then make a fire, loaf a while, and go
back down. Those that keep on wrap up as warm as
they can, and as they walk along they think at every
curve they'll see the house at the top, and when they
find still another lonely stretch ahead they sigh, *0h,
my!' and stand and rest while they look mournfully up
the long steep climb. The first part of the way every-
one is jolly and talkative, but the last part they're all
sour and sad. They go up to see the sun rise, but they're
apt to be too tired to really enjoy the sight. The first
thing they do when they get to the top is to go into the
summit house; for it's as cold as the dickins outside.
Some think they're freezin' to death, and hug close up to
the stove. That invariably makes 'em sick, while if they
warm up gradually they're all right. When I was there

Around Pike's Peak 125

last and they began to call, 'Hurry and go out — the
sun is coming up;' one sick fellow said: *Oh, goodness!
everything else has come up already, and I'm going to
stay where I am.' Of course, if the sky is perfectly
clear, the sun just rises, and that's all there is to it; but
if there are clouds the sight is really grand."

The authentic history of the mountain dates from
November 13, 1806, when Major Zebulon Pike, leading
a small exploring party of United States soldiers, sighted
the white crest from the far east. It required ten days
more to reach the base, and after vigorous attempts to
scale the mountain Pike abandoned the project with
the declaration that : " No human being could ascend to
its pinnacle."

The mountain gave Pike, and the other pathfinders
and pioneers who followed in his footsteps, the first
glad signal that there were limits to the dreary waste of
plain. It is an outlying sentinel of the Rockies, and no
other peak of these mountains equals it in fame or can
rival it as a continental landmark. Considering its
height one would expect it to be heavily snow-capped,
but there is not enough moisture in the atmosphere to
make much precipitation. The snow gathers in perma-
nent drifts in the ravines, yet the white mantle as a
whole is usually rather scanty and tattered.

The first permanent settlers of the Colorado moun-
tain region came in 1S58. They were attracted by the
reports of California emigrants that gold had been

126 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains'

found in the sands of Cherry Creek near the present
Denver. One of the men who came at that time told
me the story of his experiences. "We had our prairie
schooners," said he, " drawn by from two to eight yoke
of oxen, and we were three months on the way after
leaving the Missouri River. It was slow, tedious travel-
ling. I suppose we saw more buffaloes on that trip than
there was cattle in all the world. Some days the plains
around would be black with them as far as the eye could
reach, and when we turned our cattle out to graze we'd
have to stand guard to keep the buffaloes from stamped-
ing them. The creatures continued plentiful for more
than a dozen years longer, and I've known engineers on
the railroad to stop their trains to let a herd go past.
They used to start from northern Texas in the spring
and feed along to the Canada line. Then in the fall
they'd drift back. But where one buflFalo fed in those
days we now raise a good beef animal that provides us
with meat worth twenty times as much as that of a
buffalo. People would shoot the buffaloes for sport
from the railroad trains, and their carcasses were strewn
everywhere along the tracks. Hunters killed a great
many for meat or hides, and people came from all
over the world, especially from England, simply to see
how large a number they could kill. There'd be a party
of English lords, perhaps, each man wanting to kill
more than the others, and they'd shoot maybe a thou-
sand a day and keep up the slaughter for a month. The

Working on the road

Around Pike's Peak 127

entire plains were covered with hunting parties, and the
decomposition of the carcasses poisoned the air. There
was nothing very thrilHng in the sport. It was about
the same as to ride up beside a herd of cattle and go
popping away.

"Of course many buffaloes were also killed by the
Indians. They had their annual hunts to lay in a supply
of jerked meat; but they were out strictly for victuals,
and when that want was supplied they quit, so their
hunting alone had no appreciable effect in diminishing
the great herds. They looked on it as a task similar to
what farm work is to us. It seems to be only the civi-
lized white men who kill for pleasure; and the ex-
termination of the buffaloes was one of the Indians'
greatest grievances against us. After the plains were
clear of them the fertilizer companies had the bones
gathered, and there'd be piles as big as a house waiting
at the stations to be shipped. While the animals were
plenty everyone all over the United States who owned a
team had one or more buffalo robes, and you could get
a fairly good one for a dollar and a half, and a really
magnificent one for three dollars.

" We brought grub to last for a year. If we failed to
find gold in that time we intended to go back; and no
matter how lucky we were we didn't want to stay per-
manently in the country. We thought it was only fit
for Indians. My idea was that we could go into a can-
yon and find the pure gold sand which we would shovel

128 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

into our wagons and then turn back East. I didn't
expect I'd got to work hard. We prospected with pans,
and when things looked promising we'd make sluices
and rockers. At several places we laid out town sites.
Somebody started a town named Auralia, and then a
rival town was planned close by which we called Denver
City. It was the most desolate spot on earth, pretty
near, and we were afraid the name was about all there'd
ever be to the place, and in order to boost it as much as
we could we put 'City' on the end. I owned more town
lots there than any other man, but I sold out within a
few months. We didn't seem to light on the valuable
gold deposits we hoped to find, and I became a kind of
town speculator. Carpentering was my trade, and as
soon as I heard of a new town site being laid out I'd
rush there, build a cabin for myself, and get contracts
to build others.

"Those early cabins were just hovels with walls of
logs, and the cracks chinked with small sticks and mud.
The roofs were made of poles slanting down from the
peak to the eaves and covered with grass and dirt. For
the doors we'd split logs and hew 'em down to rough
boards, bore holes and use wooden pins to fasten the
boards together. The hinges were of wood or rawhide.
We had no glass, and the window openings would be
closed with an old sack. I got paid for my work, but
most of the towns I was interested in played out.

Around Pike's Peak I29

"Nearly all of the people who came that first season
or two were a good deal disgusted over the scarcity of
gold. A party met me one day and asked: 'Well, how
long you been here ?'

" ' I come a year ago,' I says.

" ' If you are one of the fellers that's helped get up
this Pike's Peak excitement,' they said, *I guess we'll
have to hang you.'

" They were joking, but there was a feeling that they'd
been fooled, and they called the gold attraction that
brought 'em, 'the Pike's Peak humbug.'

" Some arrived here with nothing to eat. We couldn't
let 'em starve, and we'd divide with 'em; so they fared
just as well as any of us. We could always get plenty
of game, but flour, coffee and sugar were a dollar a
pound. If food got scarce with us we'd usually rustle
around and swap some town lots or mining claims for
it. One man settled down near Denver and made a
fortune raising potatoes. He was known as 'Potato
Clark.' For one while I was sick with the scurvy from
eating nothing but bacon and hard-tack and poor bread,
and I went to Potato Clark's to stay where I could get
cured by eating fresh vegetables. He probably raised
twenty acres of potatoes that year, and I figured he got
nine hundred bushels to the acre. When he dug 'em they
lay so thick they more than covered the ground. Eating
raw potatoes and onions drove out the scurvy, and I
went back to the mountains.

130 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

"Early in 1859 the first big gold find was made by a
friend of mine named Gregory. He had been about
the poorest man in the country until then, and he was
satisfied to sell out for twenty thousand dollars and go
back to his home in Georgia. That claim probably
couldn't be bought for a million dollars today, after
being worked all the years since. Prospectors soon began
to come in crowds from the East, and generally they had
painted on the wagon cover, 'Pike's Peak or Bust.'
They didn't need to bust on account of any serious
danger to be encountered until 1864, when an Indian
war broke out. The government sent an expedition
against the savages, and I was one of the soldiers. We
knew they'd got a camp down on Sand Creek, and we
travelled three days and two nights to surprise 'em. It
was about dawn when we got there, and we rushed in
and killed some fifteen hundred men, women, and chil-
dren. Hardly a one got away alive.

"When Colorado Springs was started in 1871 I joined
in the enterprise, and that same year two of us climbed
Pike's Peak. We went over much the same ground
people do today, only then it was a pathless wilderness.
There were lots of fallen trees to climb over, and stretches
of swamp to toil through. Late in the day we got to the
timber line, wrapped up in a blanket, and lay down.
The next morning we went on, but every little while
we'd stop exhausted, breath gone and hearts working
like fire-pumps. I suppose the view from the top may

s

Around Pike's Peak 131

give pleasure to some people who make the climb — as
for me, I was so terribly fatigued I didn't care about
anything except to return. That was comparatively
easy, but the trip as a whole was the hardest task I ever
undertook in my life, and I was lame for a month. I
never could see much fun in climbing, anyway; and
yet there are people over at Manitou who take their
Alpinstocks and go rambling up and down the steep
hills every day, and claim they enjoy it.

" I was attracted by this region from the start. The
bright sunny weather that prevailed just suited me, and
if we had rain there was no mud, for the water was at
once absorbed by the porous soil. The mountains also
were an agreeable novelty compared with the country
I was used to in the East. Back in my native state of
Indiana the climate was as wretched as could be, the
air was raw and damp, and there'd be a month at a
time, almost, when you didn't cast a shadow, and there
wasn't a hill in the state that could be seen at a distance
of ten miles. The foundation of Colorado Springs'
prosperity is its reputation as a resort for health and
pleasure seekers. Otherwise, not enough natural
resources exist within twenty miles to support a town of
five hundred people."

Among the scenic attractions of the neighborhood,
the most widely known, aside from Pike's Peak, is
"The Garden of the Gods." This overspreads two or
three miles of rough hills, and the growths for which

132 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

the gods are responsible and which lend the Garden dis-
tinction, consist of a great variety of fantastic pillars and
ridges of rock, mostly of red sandstone, but with an
occasional gray upthrust of gypsum. Several of the
pinnacled and grottoed ridges are of very impressive
size, the highest over three hundred feet; and in the
lofty crannies numerous doves and swift-winged swal-
lows have their nests. Down below, the prairie larks
sing, and the robins hop about the ground, and you see
an occasional magpie. But to me the greatest pleasure
I enjoyed in the Garden was the view I had thence of
the brotherhood of giant mountains clustering about
the hoary Pike's Peak.

To see the Peak in another aspect, and to get ac-
quainted with life of a different sort from that at its
eastern base, I journeyed to Cripple Creek, forty-six
miles distant, high among the rugged ridges. The rail-
road followed up canyons, and clung along the slopes,
progressing by long curves so that in places we almost
doubled on our course. Much of the time we were in a
thin woodland of pines or aspens. The fires had run
over a large portion of the heights, yet the timber on the
burnt ground was not wholly ruined. In this dry
climate decay is slow. A tree killed by the fire and left
standing till it is thoroughly dry continues sound for
tens of years. No doubt trees killed thus half a century
ago are now being hauled from the forest to be used as
lumber.

Around Pike's Peak 133

Cripple Creek is a city of six or eight thousand people
in a wide mountain hollow. Not a tree grows along the
steep, stony, rectangular streets; and the brick blocks
of the business center, and the cottages and shacks that
serve for dweUings are equally unshadowed. The en-
vironing hills are scarcely less bare, and they shut out
of sight the mountains that rise in imposing array at no
great distance. The other towns in the group that make
up this world-famous mining camp are most of them
similarly situated in neighboring hollows within a radius
of half a dozen miles. Usually the vicinity of the houses
is strewn with tin cans and rubbish, while there often
loom close at hand the towering dumps of broken rock
from the mines. The inhabitants delve for gold. They
have no thought for beauty. The dwellings are as a
rule only one story high, and some have walls of logs.
Serpentine paths and roadways wind up and down the
hills, and lines of railway cut many a furrow, one above
the other in the steep slopes. It is said that there is a
frost at Cripple Creek every week in the year; but this
is an exaggeration. In summer the grass grows green
on the mountain sides, furnishing excellent grazing for
the cattle, and those who choose can start gardens and
raise a few vegetables.

The first house in Cripple Creek was built in 1872 by
a family of herders. The land was then unsurveyed,
and they were simply squatters who owned only the
improvements they put on the ground. These improve-

134 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

ments consisted of the house and a few outbuildings,
all of logs. They had fifteen hundred cattle, which
ranged over a territory about eight miles long by four
broad. I asked a member of the family whom I met,
how the place got its name.

"Well," he said, "soon after we came here, my
brother fell off the house and got pretty badly mashed
up. A little later, the horse that a cowboy who worked
for us was riding r'ared up and keeled over backward
breaking the fellow's leg. Then my father one day run
across a buffalo calf in with the cows, and he was going
to shoot the creature, but as he was drawing his pistol
he in some way discharged it and maimed his hand.
These accidents led the cowboys to call the little stream
in the hollow, on the banks of which we lived. Cripple
Creek. We stayed only three years and then disposed
of most of our cattle, sold our buildings, and moved to
another valley.

"One of the boys in the family that bought us out got
the idea that this was a gold-bearing country, and he
was always prospecting. That stirred up some interest,
and there was more or less searching for gold right along
afterward. But the old-fashioned prospectors who
looked around here condemned the region. The rock
was porphery and granite, and gold had never been
found in such rock; so the pioneer discoveries were
made by tenderfoots who had no theories. Nothing
important was brought to light till 1890, and that made

Around Pike's Peak 135

no excitement, for the experts continued to be pessimis-
tic, and even after we were shipping two or three hun-
dred thousand dollars worth of ore a month they still
claimed that only a few chance veins existed, which
would soon play out. But after a while the public got
interested, and people were jumping in here from far
and near. They staked the whole country. All you
had to do to secure a claim was to blaze a tree or set up
some sort of mark and run your lines fifteen hundred
feet from there in one direction and three hundred in
the other. Naturally the claims often overlapped each
other. The first comer had the best rights, but there
was lots of litigation. To hold your claim you had to
sink a shaft ten feet deep, or in some way do a hundred
dollars worth of work on it each year. You must also
have discovered a vein of ore, but as any sort of a vein
was considered an ore vein until it was proved otherwise
that was no hindrance. Actual mining was not carried
on very vigorously for several years. Most claim owners
seemed content to incorporate companies for a million
or two and make money selling stock. It was simply a
boost business, and often the claims were good for noth-
ing anyway.

" The gold occurs here in streaks running from below
upward. There seemed to have been a kind of golden
blowout, and in one spot you'll find a vein of gold and
a little beyond not a trace. The area of payrock appears
to be Hmited to a patch about three miles across; but

136 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

the country is full of prospect holes for ten miles around.
That means a tremendous amount of wasted labor.
Probably there was never a more profitable gold camp
than this, and yet if we get on the average one dollar for
ten expended we think we're doing well. However, the
lucky fellows become immensely rich, and it's just a
legitimate gamble.

"The city here grew very fast when it got started,
until by and by we had a fire that nearly destroyed it.
The buildings were all of wood, but the trouble was
with our volunteer fire department. Everyone was
telling everyone else what to do, and no one was doing
anything effective. The fire started in a shack with a
corrugated iron roof, and the boys wasted their energy
playing the water on that red hot iron and hearing it
sizz, instead of getting inside to business. So the fire
spread and wiped out a big piece of the town."

Another blow to the prosperity of the region was the
great strike of 1904. I frequently heard of this, and
differing opinions were expressed, but no one seemed
to take much pride in any of the events connected with
it. One miner who talked with me very frankly said the
relations of the employers and their help had from the
first been far from satisfactory. "We had a rough, wild
crowd here," said he, "and some of 'em thought nothing
of killing a man and then throwing him down an old shaft
where he'd never be heard from. There was lots of
high-grading going on — that is, there were fellows steal-

Sorting over the old mine dumps

Around Pike's Peak 137

ing high-grade ore. They'd go down abandoned work-
ings and hike around through into a mine where the ore
was valuable. The mines were worked in two shifts,
and they'd plan to do their stealing when the only per-
son on duty was the watchman. He couldn't keep
track of the whole mine, and the high-graders were able
to load up with ore and get away. The regular mine
workers were high-graders, too. They'd hide the ore
in their clothing, and even though the mine owners knew
of the stealing they didn't dare say a word for fear the
miners would strike.

"By and by a worthless, no-account walloper was
fired from an ore mill at Colorado Springs. The union
here took up the matter, and when the mill owners
wouldn't reinstate the man, the miners all quit work.
Non-union men were brought in, and a lot of 'em were
dynamited at the Independence railway station. Then
the soldiers came and there were guns flashing around
everywhere, and the women didn't dare put their noses
out of their doors. Some men were deported and others
went away of their own accord, and the union, after
monkeying around a long time, gave up the fight. At
present there are more workers than work, so the em-
ployers have things their own way, and this is a regular
slave camp."

The old boom days when everyone had money ,^ and
speculation and ferment were omnipresent will prob-
ably never return. This is not due entirely to the strike.

138 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

but would have come in the natural course of events.
The mines produce more than ever before, but they
have installed the latest labor-saving devices, and often
several have combined to work their holdings in com-
mon. As a result one man perhaps accomplishes as
much as five did a few years ago, the inhabitants have
decreased, and the towns have a rusty, battered look
that is far from cheerful. The town that has suffered
most seems to be Altman, which is on one of the bleak-
est hilltops. But to compensate for its broken-windowed
dilapidation it enjoys a noble outlook on the mountains.
In one direction is the Great Divide, a long range of
blue-based, snowy pinnacles, and in the other, near at
hand, is Pike's Peak Hfting its white crown far into the
blue. This lonely sentinel, indeed, dominates the re-
gion for a hundred miles around.

Note. — Pike's Peak is the best known height in the Rockies. Its
name is familiar everywhere; and this fact alone is a su£Bcient reason
for desiring to see it with one's own eyes. Partly because of this at-
traction, and partly because of other favors bestowed by nature, the
section of country immediately to the east of the mountain is one of
the most notable pleasure resorts of the continent. Colorado Springs,
the chief town of the region, is in its way very nearly ideal, with fine
buildings, broad tree-lined streets and pleasant parks, and a beautiful
view of the great snow-capped Peak and its companion heights. Close
by is the Garden of the Gods, and the picturesque Cheyenne Canyon.
At the base of the Peak is the village of Manitou in a graceful vale
encompassed by cathedral hills and with the added attraction of
sparkling, health-giving mineral springs. Many delightful rambles
and carriage drives are possible, and the Peak invites you to climb, if
you wish to do something very strenuous.

Around Pike's Peak 139

Twenty-four miles north of Colorado Springs, on the road to Denver, is
Palmer Lake, the most celebrated resort in the state after Manitou. The
Ute Indians, in a legend similar to the account of the flood in the Bible, tell
how the ark containing all the living creatures that escaped drowning was
left by the subsiding waters on a spur of the mountains just back of Palmer
Lake. When the animals came forth from the ark and went down on the
plain they dwelt there domestically with the human beings. But one day,
while the warriors were all absent exploring the country, a cross old woman
who was left in charge of the camp was hindered in her work by the animals
getting in her way, and she gave them a furious scolding. The animals were
so frightened that they fled, and since then the Indians have been obliged to
hunt them.

Denver, the "Queen City of the Plains," is the capital of the state. Not
far west of it the Rocky Mountains loom in an unbroken line along the
horizon. The museum in the City Park contains an interesting collection of
Colorado animals. Nine miles northwest is Boulder Canyon, and drives
may be made from there to the picturesque Gregory and Sunshine Canyons.
Similarly attractive is Clear Creek Canyon, sixteen miles west of Denver,
where some of the cliffs are one thousand feet high. Idaho Springs, 20 miles
farther on is frequented for its hot and cold mineral springs. Another popu-
lar summer resort is Georgetown, fifty miles west of Denver. Still higher in
the same direction among the mountains the railroad passes through the
Devil's Gate and climbs upward by the famous loop that bends back on
itself and crosses the track previously traversed by a lofty bridge.

If you would see agricultural Colorado at its best journey north to Greeley
or some other place in the valley of the South Platte. When Greeley was
founded in 1870 the region was a cactus plain uninhabited save by two or
three isolated ranchers. At night the sleep of the newcomers was disturbed
by the melancholy howling of wolves. The settlers were discouraged, but
they set to work and constructed a system of irrigation canals, and made
the vicinity one of the most fruitful spots in the world.

The eastern part of the state affords many opportunities for motoring,
and the scenery and climate offer great attractions for such recreation.
The main route north and south goes from Cheyenne, Wyoming, through
Denver, Colorado Springs, and Pueblo down into New Mexico. Several
routes come in from the east, and it is possible to go on over the mountains
to Salt Lake City. The roads are for the most part excellent in fine weather
and quite otherwise in bad weather.

VIII

IN THE HEART OF THE ROCKIES

THE mountains that form the backbone of the con-
tinent are not a single series of ridges, or a closely
huddled line of peaks; but there are many half-
related ranges and groups of rough upheavals that are
widely separated, or that have among them frequent
great pastoral valleys. Some of the valleys are fully
fifty miles long and nearly as wide, and are open graz-
ing and farm land, Whether large or small, a mountain
valley of this type is called "a park;" and it was in one
of the lesser parks that I made my first stop, after pass-
ing through the wild and impressive canyon of the Royal
Gorge that gashes the eastern buttresses of the moun-
tains. The gentle levels of the vale, its trees feathering
into new leafage along the streams, its cultivated fields
and blossoming orchards were delightful — ^the more so,
no doubt, because they were rimmed about by dark,
wooded heights, and were guarded at a somewhat re-
moter distance by the white peaks of the Great Divide.
At least half a dozen snow-clad summits were in sight,
each over fourteen thousand feet high.

In the Heart of the Rockies 141

The winter was not entirely vanquished yet, and the
mountains were often obscured by drifting snowsqualls
that sometimes descended into the valley and sprinkled
the earth with quick-melting flakes. To these frosty
flurries the farmers paid no attention, but went on put-
ting in their crops and hoeing their gardens. Some of
the local dwellers complained that the seasons were too
short, but as a whole they were contented and even
enthusiastic. "This is the best place the sun shines on,"
declared one man; "and we have more bright days
than anywhere else on earth."

He had left an Eastern city to seek health, and had
found it in the high, dry air and out-door life he led in
this Rocky Mountain park. His wife worked with him
in the fields, and they were happy and prosperous and
had no desire to become city dwellers again.

" But we have to irrigate to raise any crops," said he,
"and that ain't no such easy job as a good many people
back East imagine. They seem to think all you've got
to do is to turn a faucet to make it rain all over your
farm, and that then you can go and lay down. But we
have to plough and harrow, and we have to fight the
weeds, and there's lots of digging necessary to make
water ditches and keep 'em in order."

Then, changing the subject, he added : "You ought to
climb that mountain over to the southward. It's the
highest one around here, except those with the snow on
'em, and you can see the whole world at one sweep from
the top of it."

142 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

However, I preferred to keep to the valley. Its chief
highway was known as the old Leadville Trail, and in
the early days before the railroad was built this had been
a very populous thoroughfare. At one point was an
ancient "roadhouse" or tavern, now verging on dilapi-
dation, but impressive by reason of its size and its
connection with a stirring and romantic past. In the
gold excitement days it was always crowded, and many
travellers paid fifty cents each for the privilege of sleep-
ing in their own blankets on the piazza.

One man, whose parents came to the vicinity at that
period and settled on a cattle ranch, told me something
of his experiences. "I was a boy then," said he, "and
I used to sell buttermilk to the Leadville freighters.
They'd have their white prairie schooners with two or
three spans of horses or mules attached, and generally
went in bands, several together, and camped nights by
the roadside.

"We often saw wild horses up in the hills, and the
fellows would build a corral with wing fences in order
to capture 'em. As soon as there was a good chance, the
boys would circle around the broncos and work 'em
down to the fences and into the corral. When they were
out running loose they looked like nice horses; but in
actual use they weren't very desirable in most ways.
Yet they were so nimble and tough they couldn't be
beat for the cattle business. The worst thing about 'em
was that you'd got to break 'em over again every time

In the Heart of the Rockies 143

you rode 'em. My father bought one for me when I
was about fifteen years old. I knew more then than I
ever shall again, and I picked her out myself. 'There's
a dandy,' I says.

"The man we bought her of claimed she was good
and gentle and all that. So I expected she'd be quiet
as a lamb; but, whatever her temper, I wore big cowboy
spurs and was equal to anything. As it happened, she
proved to be a Virginia rail fence bucker. She didn't
buck straight ahead, but would give side jumps, first
this way, then that, and stifF-legged too. I hadn't been
on her back half a minute before I was thrown off. As
soon as I could pick myself up I mounted once more,
and the bronco got ready to go after me. Up she went
into the air, and when I was comin' down I met her
goin' up on the next trip. But I hung on till the horse
tossed her head back and hit me in the nose. That took
all the ginger out of me, and I was ready to quit. I
owned her for a number of years, but I never could tell
when I got on her which way the hurricane was goin ' to
strike me. Once she carried me straight across an
eighty acre field as tight as she could go and tried to
jump a wire fence. Her heels caught in the wires, and
she would have been badly hurt only she got so beauti-
fully tangled up she couldn't struggle.

"The worst proposition I ever had was a mule, and
there's nothing tougher or meaner on earth unless it's
two mules. The first time I got a-hold of her we were

144 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

hauling dry peas out of a field, and you know how
those'll rattle. I hitched her to the tail end of the wagon
rack, and she had to come right along whether she liked
the rattling or not. But after a while she made a plunge
sideways that cut the rope against the edge of the rack,
and she made off for the range. I wore out one horse
and almost wore out another before I caught her. From
time to time afterward I tried breaking her, but I
couldn't get her under control. You might just as well
ride on a steam engine. She'd run about two hundred
yards and stop, and if you weren't on the alert you'd go
over her head. Finally I traded her off, and she changed
hands pretty rapidly for the future. At last she got
away with a saddle on her and led the owner such a
chase that he shot her in order to get the saddle.

"We had a range of about a thousand acres, and
kept something like a hundred cattle — let 'em run. It
was rather discouraging there were so many losses.
During the winter the cattle became lean and weak, and
in the spring they'd get into mudholes and not have the
strength to wade out. Some were stolen, and others
were destroyed by the railway trains. You see the
track melted free of snow sooner than most of the land
around. So at night the cattle would lie down on it to
keep wgrm and dry; and if they chose a spot that the
train come on suddenly from around a curve they'd be
run over.

The farmer and his helpmate

In the Heart of the Rockies 145

"We raised alfalfa and cut considerable wire grass on
the low ground, and we could have fed the cattle some
in the bad weather of the cold months. But that wasn't
economy. It made the cattle expect to be fed right
along, and they'd hang around and bawl instead of
getting out on the range to rustle for themselves. The
horses were able to stand exposure better than the cattle.
They could wade through the snow easier, and go much
farther for food, and they'd come down from the moun-
tains in the spring in pretty good shape and as shaggy
as sheep.

"Our hardest work was in June and September
when we had our roundups. The whole country was
laid off in roundup districts, and the ranchers would
combine to do the work. We'd have a grub wagon
along; and one rancher would furnish the team, and
another the wagon, and we'd all chip intosupplythefood.
Each day we'd go over ten or fifteen miles of country
and drive the cattle to some central point agreed on;
and I tell you it ain't what it's cracked up to be — this
keeping in the saddle hour after hour from early morn-
ing till the middle of the afternoon. The June roundup
was for calves, and each day when the drive was fin-
ished we'd grab a little to eat and go to branding. We'd
have a lot of branding irons in the fire, and there'd per-
haps be a dozen fellows, and we didn't stop till all the
calves in the drive were branded even if it took us till
after dark. Each calf was branded the same as the

146 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

cow it was running with. The September roundup was
to pick out the creatures we wanted to sell for beef. It's
astonishing how widely scattered even a little herd gets;
for a long storm will drift 'em horribly. I'd have to be
out at least a week to cover the ground where our cattle
were likely to wander.

" Around our home were a few acres that we irrigated.
We had a very good water right; for we'd filed on it
early. You were allowed to file on as much water as
you could reasonably use on your land. But it was
first come, first served, and in a dry time the later ar-
rivals suffered. The water right is the most important
item in the value of a farm here, and has often been a
cause of bloodshed. For instance, my wife's father,
who was a quiet, law-abiding man in every way, had
some dispute with a neighbor over their water claims
and was shot at from a fence near which he was digging
a ditch. The bullet went through his blouse. With
only a shovel in his hands he ran and drove off the fel-
low who'd done the shooting.

"A night or two later his house was set on fire, and
when he came hurrying out to see what he could do to
save his property he was shot dead. His wife dragged
him beyond reach of the flames, extinguished the fire,
and rode off to get help. A vigilance committee started
for the home of the murderer, but they got a little too
hilarious on the way, and were so slow, someone had time
to give the fellow the wink, and he escaped. We had

In the Heart of the Rockies 147

some rough doings in those days, and every old-timer
used to keep a revolver hanging on his bedpost."

Now, however, life in the valley is scarcely less peace-
ful than nature itself, and I left this pleasant region
doubting whether I would find another among the
mountains equally attractive. Certainly Leadville,
my next stopping-place, was not such a spot. When I
arrived in the late evening the snow was steadily sifting
down from a sky where, behind a thin haze of cloud,
the full moon shone dimly.

"We have snow every month in the year," commented
a native. "This is a funny country. Once it snowed
like sixty on the Fourth of July."

Leadville lies at an elevation of over ten thousand
feet, and is sometimes spoken of as "the town above
the clouds." Winter seemed to have the whole region
in its chill grip on my first morning there, and a frosty
wind blew from the big bleak hills and frozen moun-
tains roundabout. But the snow which covered the
ground melted rapidly, and by noon the town emerged
from its white robes in all its usual dinginess. The
larger part of the place is a treeless huddle of frail cot-
tages and shanties, many of which are dilapidated and
vacant. However, it is only fair to say that much of the
business section has an air of well-built permanence,
and there are certain residence streets, where the homes,
in size, architecture, and surroundings, are suggestive of
comfort and refinement.

148 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

A peculiarity of the mines of the district is the great
variety of metals they produce. These include silver,
gold, zinc, lead, iron, and copper. But it was gold that
first attracted miners to the region. For several years
they delved in the gulches, and washed the silt in their
pans and cradles and troughs without getting any
phenomenal returns. The excitement began in the
spring of 1878 when ore remarkably rich in lead and
silver was discovered. "Then," as an old miner ex-
plained to me, "people began pilin' in here from all
parts of the world. They came in wagons and on horse-
back and in the stages, and by 1881 we had a city of
thirty-seven thousand inhabitants. This used to be a
pretty lively country, but it's dead now.

"My pardner and I were among the early comers,
and we located in California Gulch and put up a tent
to live in. But the tent was just temporary, and in the
course of a few weeks we built a log cabin. Later I fixed
up a shanty of slabs right in the sagebrush where the heart
of the city now is, and I fenced it in, too. Pretty soon
afterward I went off to work in another camp for a few
months, and when I came back, cabin, fence and all
were gone. I knew where they were, but it meant gun
play to get possession. So I said, 'Never mind.'

"The place was crowded. Why, Lord! you could
hardly get through the streets there were so many people
and teams, and the noise never stopped, day or night.
Little sawmills were stuck up here and there, but they

In the Heart of the Rockies 149

couldn't get out lumber fast enough, and men would
take slabs or anything else to build their shanties. Often
they made the sides of boards and the roof of canvas
and got along that way. Every man brought blankets,
and quite a few just wrapped up and slept under trees,
or in the saloons. The saloons were open all night, and
there'd be fellows lying around on the sawdust-strewn
floor so thick you could hardly step between them. In
the morning they'd roll up their blankets and go about
their business. There was no charge. It was a sort of
advertisement that brought the saloon custom. A
gambling den was always run in connection with the
saloon, and there were plenty of dives ready to rob any-
one they could get hold of. It was a rough place, and
the mortality was blamed bad, too. But in three or
four years they cleaned up some-, and if the police found
a man with a gun they run him in. After that there
was more reason for being scairt back in the Eastern
cities than there was here.

"The men living in tents usually cooked their meals
outside over an open fire, but you'd find a sheet-iron
stove in most of the cabins. A frying-pan and pot were
about the extent of our cooking utensils. The meat we
ate was nearly all bacon and ham, and navy beans were
a great standby. We didn't use much butter or milk,
and it was darn seldom we got any potatoes.

"Wherever a new mining camp was started, the
lawyers and doctors came in with the swim. There'd

150 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

be about a couple each of lawyers and snide doctors,
even if there wa'n't more'n fifty men in the camp. The
ministers wouldn't arrive till later; but it was a good
business proposition for them, too. Money was as free
as water, and when a church was to be built, or a bell
bought, the minister would make the rounds of the
gambling hells and other places to get contributions,
and the fellows would all dish out. Even if they never
went to church they'd give just the same. The Irish
were church-goers, but the balance of the gang — no.
Perhaps everyone would turn out to a revival and throw
in a little boodle — from one to five dollars apiece.
That's as near, though, as they came to bein' religious;
and yet I've never seen a crowd like there is in this
town when it comes to givin' every religion a show,
even if they don't care about any of 'em. One night a
drunken fellow went to interfere with a Salvation Army
service. As often as they'd start to sing or preach he'd
butt in. But the crowd soon put a stop to his nonsense.
They kicked him all over the street, and then he was
thrown into jail.

"While the mining excitement was at its height it
was queer how eager people were to invest. They had
an idea, if they could get a claim most anywhere within
a few miles of where the big finds were made, their future
fortune was sure. 'Can't you put me onto something ?'
a stranger would say to you; and if you were at all
acquainted with the region you'd go and show him a

In the Heart of the Rockies 151

spot that hadn't been taken up. In an hour's time
you'd very likely get for the assistance rendered two
or three hundred dollars. Lots of these investors would
sink a shaft fifty feet or so, and then go away and never
be heard of afterward.

" I used to have a third interest in one of the best
claims here. If I hadn't sold out I'd have been a mil-
lionaire. My pardners were Charlie Jones and a man
named Robinson. By and by Robinson wanted to buy
us out, and about that time Charlie went on a tear, and
one morning when he'd been drinking all night we
found him dead behind the stove. Then Robinson
went right off East to Charlie's relatives and bought out
his interest for seventeen hundred dollars. He wanted
to bulldoze me into selling at his price, too.

"We had a gang of lawyers here who were always
ready to take up your quarrels. 'I'll win for you,'
they'd say, and encourage you to spend your money,
even if you had no chance at all. I engaged one of
'em, but before the case came up for trial and showed
whether he was any good, Robinson settled with me for
thirty thousand dollars.

"A while later he had some trouble with the super-
intendent at the mine and turned him off and stationed
guards with orders to let no one they didn't know ap-
proach the property. But one evening he walked up to
the mine himself, and the guard didn't recognize him in
the darkness. Robinson paid no attention when he was

152 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

ordered to stop, and the guard banged away and wounded
him so badly that he only lived a day or two afterward.
But Robinson never blamed the guards who he said had
simply done his duty, and he willed him a thousand
dollars. However, the guard worried considerable over
what had happened, and though he was naturally sober
and industrious he took to drink and was good for
nothing afterward.

"Well, I had all that money I spoke of, and I went to
Denver and bought a home. I was goin' to quit min-
ing, but the first thing I knew I was in deeper than ever,
and the money slipped away. That's how it is in min-
ing — easy made and easy gone. Some of my old friends
made millions, and yet died poor. You see they'd get
to speculating, and everybody was after 'em when they
had money. 'We've got a deal on,' the fellows would
say, 'and will give you a chance;' and most every deal
made a hole in the fortune. There was Finnerty had
three hundred thousand dollars and lost it horse-racing;
and there was John Morrisey, Diamond Joe's pardner.
He got to be very rich though he couldn't read or write.
Why, he carried an expensive watch, but was too ig-
norant to tell the time of day by it. You ask him the
time, and he'd take out his watch sayin', 'I do' know —
about so and so,' making as good a guess as he could.
Then turning it toward you he'd say, 'and to show you
I ain't lyin', look yourself

A placer miner in a Leadvtlle gulch

In the Heart of the Rockies 153

"Once the priest asked him to help buy a chandelier
for the church. 'A chandelier' — says John, 'sure, that
there church ought to have one. Put me down for a
hundred dollars. But who are you goin' to get to
play it.?'

"He was prosperous until some dirty trick of his
made Diamond Joe drop him. After that he went to
the dogs. His friends deserted him, his wife got a
divorce, and he died a pauper; but we saw that he had
a nice burial.

"That shows the way things have gone at the mines
here; and the town has had its ups and downs, too.
You may think it's destined to be wiped off the map
presently, but I tell you it'll be a camp after we're all
dead and gone."

Probably nothing Uke the spectacular boom of the
early days will be known at Leadville again; but it
will be a long, long time before the region ceases to be a
wealth-producer.

Still another place that I visited among the tangled
heights near the crest of the continent was a hamlet
some fifty miles farther west, deep in a wild hollow.
Two or three streams met just there, and they were
crowded so closely by the steep ridges that rose around
as to afford the village only the slenderest foothold. If
you followed the streams back into the hills you were
sometimes in forest, sometimes amid beetling cliffs,
while the water hastened down the ravine with many a

154 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

foaming leap and tumultuous rapid. Here and there
you came across a mine or a little sawmill, and at rare
intervals occurred marshy meadows and possibly a rude
ranch with a few scanty fields. In favorable places you
saw great white peaks peering over the near slopes.
The most notable of these is the Mountain of the Holy
Cross; but the emblem which gives the peak its name
does not appear till nearly midsummer. Then the snow
has melted from the high cliffs and is only retained in
two deep ravines that form a cross. This continues in
view until the late fall when the snows again take posses-
sion of the entire crest.

The situation of the village was quite delightful, but
its huddled double line of cheap angular wooden build-
ings had not the least touch of grace. Luckily the mines
were beyond view. Most of them were down the main
canyon clinging along the face of a vast precipice.

One day, after a long tramp among the hills, I sat
down in the village drug store. A young woman was in
charge, and she was as ready to impart information as
to serve customers. Trade was not very brisk. A man
came in to buy a bottle of patent medicine, a housewife
invested in a box of rat poison, and a young fellow se-
lected a dime's worth of candy to which he treated the
girl who sold it. Afterward the candy-buyer lit a cigaret
and backed up to the stove with his hands behind him
as if to warm himself. Thereupon the girl chaffed him,
for there was no fire in the stove.

A chat on the highway

In the Heart of the Rockies 155

"But I don't blame you, Charlie," she continued.
"A person gets used to thinkin' it's cold here in this
place. Heavens! what winters we have! It's nothing
at all to get up and find the thermometer twenty and
thirty below zero. The snow lasts from November to
April. But the grass and things grow fast when they
once start. There's flowers blossoming before you
know it. Oh my goodness! the clusters of anemones
come right out of the snow, almost. In another month
the hills where the sheep and cattle graze will be just
covered with columbine."

"Where were you last evening.'"' asked Charlie.

"The moon shone," said she, "and it was such a
pretty night that I went for a walk. But we certainly
are hemmed in here. You can't go far without getting
into the wilderness. There's only the one street, and at
each end it runs smack up against a mountain. I don't
know where we would put another building, and I'm
not sure we can keep all that we have now. Lately the
mountain seems to be comin' down and crowding our
church out into the street. That's a funny thing to
happen, and I've had more laughs about it than a few.

"I believe there's about two hundred people in the
place when they're all at home, but half of 'em are gen-
erally gone; and yet we can support three saloons.
Yes, and we have two weekly newspapers, but one of
'em is so weakly we're never sure there'll be another
issue. Then, too, there's our hack. The railroad sta-
tion had to be put farther down the crick because of

156 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains'

lack of room in the village, and as soon as you get off
the train they ask if you want a hack. But when you
look around — gee! you find only an express wagon.
We have an opera house, and sometimes a show com-
pany drops off here. That's happened only once though
in the last six months. Of course pretty near everyone
went — ^you bet they did! I wished I hadn't afterward.
It was something awful — the rottenest show I ever *saw
in my life. Saturday night, a week ago, we had an ice-
cream social at the church — fifteen cents a dish, and a
dance at the opera house afterward. The entertainment
kept going till half-past one, and I thought they must
be pretty good church members to eat and dance over
into Sunday.

"We dance quite a little in the winter — anything for
a pastime! Often there's as many as twenty-five couples.
We use the old schoolhouse. It isn't good for much else
since they've put up the new one. An organ and violin
furnish music, and we have three big lamps for light.
Once in a while a four-horse load of young people drive
up Turkey Crick to a dance at Clifftop. It's claimed
they've got a better floor there than here; but that's
never induced me to go. Gee whiz! the road don't look
any too good in the daytime, and of course it's icy and
slippery, and we might slide off down into the canyon."

These elucidations made it evident that though a
stranger might fancy the village to be rather oppres-
sively secluded, its life was not without piquancy and

In the Heart of the Rockies 157

a somewhat varied enjoyment. As for its surroundings,
their wild charm could hardly be excelled.

Note. — The most picturesque passage through the mountains on any of
our several great transcontinental railroad routes is that of the Denver and
Rio Grande. It is by way of the magnificent Royal Gorge whose towering
cliffs form one of the most impressive of canyons. This is the gateway to
western Colorado — a broken region of tremendous mountain ranges inter-
mitting with many a sheltered pastoral valley. Any of these valleys will
amply repay a visit, but I would mention Salida and Buena Vista as places
that especially appealed to me.

By turning a little aside from the main route one can visit Leadville in
its lofty eyrie. The chief attraction of the town is its reputation as a mining
camp, though the surrounding region is not without considerable scenic
beauty.

In the late summer and early autumn a pause at Red Cliff, about fifty
miles west of Leadville, is to be recommended. The little village itself with
its Swiss-like environment is quite delightful, and the Mountain of the Holy
Cross is at that season in all its glory. The mountain can be glimpsed from
the railroad, but a really intimate acquaintance with it necessitates a some-
what arduous trip of a dozen miles back into the woods from Red Cliff.

Still farther west is the well-known health resort of Glenwood Springs in
a beautiful valley surrounded by forest-clad hills. Another place worthy of
special notice is Grand Junction, in the vicinity of which is some of the most
productive fruit country to be found in the entire Rocky Mountain region.

In the southwestern corner of the state is Mancos, the starting-point of
the twenty mile trail to the famous cliff dwellings of the Mancos Canyon.
These rank among the most impressive remains of this kind.

IX

LIFE IN A MORMON VILLAGE

IT was an old-fashioned little place — one of the early
settlements near the shores of the Great Salt Lake.
Close behind rose a steep, lofty mountain ridge.
Tall Lombardy poplars lined the streets and stood in
stately rows along the borders of the fields, while the
houses nestled amid apple, cherry, peach, and other
fruit trees. The dwellings were apt to be small, but
their vernal setting of trees and vines made them quite
idyllic. Irrigation ditches networked the whole region,
and the life-giving water flowed in swift streams on one
side or the other of every street. In the open country
roundabout were broad acres of wheat and alfalfa, and
luscious pastures.

During my stay in the village I lodged in one of the
Mormon homes. It was on a grassy lane a little off the
chief street, and was snugly fenced from the encroach-
ment of the cows that grazed in the lane for a time
both morning and evening. The main part of the house
was of adobe, but there was a newer portion of wood.
None of it was over one story high, and the crudity of
its appointments can be judged by the fact, that to wash

/It the hack door of an adobe house

Life in a Mormon Village 159

my hands and face I had to resort to the little shed
kitchen, where there was a tin basin on a stand, and a
pail of water on a chair. The dirty water was thrown
out of the back door.

From beneath the trees that shadowed the house I
could see the Salt Lake far off across the lowlands, and
beyond the silvery water were lines of high blue ridges
crowned with snow. One morning I started out to get
a nearer view of the lake, and a three-mile walk across
the marshy lowlands took me to a wide stretch of oozy
beach that stopped my farther progress. I was a little
disappointed because I wanted to taste the water. It
could hardly be very palatable, for it is about twenty-
five per cent salt — a per cent only exceeded by the
Dead Sea in Palestine. Yet the lake is not always
equally salty; for it has periods of rising and falling that
extend somewhat regularly over a series of years. Be-
tween the lowest and the highest level there is a differ-
ence of sixteen feet, and the saltiness of the water varies
accordingly. This has been down to eleven per cent,
the record for dilution, while the other extreme is over
three times that amount. Salt from the lake, obtained
by evaporation, is shipped away in vast quantities.

Some ten thousand or more years ago the lake was a
magnificent body of fresh water the size of Lake Huron,
and its outlet was by way of the Columbia River into the
Pacific Ocean. Since that time the climate has become

i6o Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

arid, and the lake has gradually dried up from over a
thousand feet deep to about twenty feet, and it has less
than a tenth of its original area.

The salt makes the water very heavy, and the waves
roll with a lazy motion, but with tremendous force. A
person can lie flat on his back in the water, and a third
of his body will be above the surface. There are no
fish in the lake, and life is confined to a little shrimp
about a fourth of an inch long and a small worm.
Hundreds of the shrimps are found in every bucket
of water, and in the season the water is milky with
the eggs of these creatures. Except at that time the
water is as clear as crystal.

The vicinity by the lakeshore that I visited did not
entice me to linger. It was almost bare of trees; and
there were gulls flying about, and numerous snipe, and
a few heron and sandpipers, whose lonely cries hastened
my inclination to return to the town.

The place seemed very effectively sheltered from rude
gales by its trees and the lofty ridge behind; and yet
my landlady said: "The east wind is often a regular
hurricane here in the autumn. It takes roofs off and
blows barns to pieces and breaks down the apple trees;
and it will just keep up that way for three or four days.
We have storms other times, too. Only last week it
snowed here Hke the dickins; and it's very seldom that
we don't get a snowstorm in May. Some of the storms

Co

u

Life in a Mormon Village i6i

seem fearful at the time, but they don't do such damage
as to prevent the people being mostly pretty prosperous."

The family with which I was stopping ordinarily
consisted of Mrs. Dutton, my landlady, and two daugh-
ters. There had, however, been a full dozen of chil-
dren, and though the others had married and established
homes of their own, some of them were frequently drop-
ping in to call, and occasionally might stay for a meal or
spend the night. They were a lively clan and had a
breezy Western way of talking that was characterized
by a good deal of slangy vigor. Mrs. Dutton herself
was a kind-hearted, motherly old body to whom the
tumultuous ebullitions of her progeny were at times
disturbing, but she was not without energy and a keen
tongue. " You're gettin ' crazier every day ! " she would
declare, addressing her daughters; "I'd have you to
know, though, that I'm boss of this shebang, and I
won't be run over."

One day a tramp came begging at the kitchen door,
and she fed him. "Perhaps I ought not to have done
it," she philosophized afterward, "but I can't turn a
tramp off to save my soul. Brigham Young used to say:
'There's three kinds of poor — the Lord's poor, the
devil's poor, and the poor devils.' That is, the worthy
poor, the vicious poor, and those who are shiftless and
incapable. He said each class ought to be treated dif-
ferently; and that some of the poor shouldn't be helped

1 62 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

at all. But if a man says he's hungry I can't do any-
thing only feed him, no matter what he is."

While we were talking two of her grandchildren
wandered in, and I asked her how many she had in all.
She hesitated. "To tell you the truth, I've forgot,"
said she, and began to reckon up — eleven in one family,
nine in another, five in another and so on.

The two children, a boy and a girl, were quite small,
and presently the landlady's daughter Dora took them
in hand to tidy up their hair. She got along all right
with the boy; but there seemed to be molasses or some-
thing of the sort in the little girl's flossy tresses, and no
sooner was the combing started than the child doubled
over and began to cry. "Shut up, miss!" said the
young lady. "Quit your bawling!"

"Don't cry, lovey," begged grandma. "Why Dora,
she's just a-sobbing — for goodness sake!"

"She's trying to cry, and that's all there is of it,"
affirmed Dora. "Stop it, you little stink! If your
mother was here she'd slap you!"

At last the process was completed and the children
were free to play. About that time their mother arrived.
"Everybody's always thought this was a slow old town,"
she remarked; "but it's coming out of its kinks now.
They're going to get power from a stream on the moun-
tain and light the place with electricity."

"Well, my gosh!" exclaimed Dora, "that will make
this place quite modern."

Life in a Mormon Village 163

" I see you are wearing one of those new-fashioned
wide-brimmed hats," said Mrs. Button.

"Yes," assented the newcomer, whom the others
addressed as Angeline, "everybody has to have 'em
now; but I tried this on mother, and her small face
under such a wide brim looked just like a peanut."

"Winnie Snell is going to be married next week,"
observed Dora.

" I've expected that would be the outcome all along,"
said Angeline. "It's too bad. He's about the poorest
piece of humanity she could pick up. He may be good
and all that, but he's sickly. Her folks have kept up
the darndest row ever since he began going with her,
and they've tried their best to keep 'em apart. So of
course they was bound to have each other, and you
couldn't have pried 'em apart with an iron bar. If ever
my daughter has a beau that I don't like I'll have him
in the house to breakfast, dinner, and supper and let her
get so much of his company she'll be tired of him; but
the guy I do want her to have I'll just about kick out of
the back door to make the match certain."

"Winnie is a good Mormon," commented Mrs. Dut-
ton; "but I don't think the fellow is."

"That's all right," said Angeline. "I'm not a good
Mormon either, though there's lots of elders and bishops
and other church officers in our family. What they tell
about the way the Mormon religion started sounds like
a fairy tale to me."

164 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

" It's all true — every word of it," asserted Mrs. Dut-
ton. "The things that happened to Joseph Smith are
just as easy to believe as what you read in the Bible.
You'll find the Bible says : 'In the last days the gospel
shall be revealed.' That's what was done through our
prophet Joseph Smith. He began to be troubled about
religion when he was only a boy, and one time in his
bedroom there come over him such a darkness as nearly
strangled him. That was the devil. Afterward he was
surrounded by a great glory of light. That was God ;
and the boy asked which of the different religions was
right. God said that none of 'em were right, but he
would reveal to him the true religion written on some
plates of gold buried in a certain hill. Joseph went to
the hill and got the plates. When he began to preach
the new religion he was persecuted, and once when the
mob was after him he hid the golden plates in a barrel
of beans to save 'em from destruction. I don't see any-
thing about all that but what a person can believe easy
enough; and there's no other religion I'd accept in the
place of Mormonism."

Angeline was still unconvinced; but she said she
was going to sit down sometime and read the Book of
Mormon through to see what she could make of it. At
present she was unregenerate enough to have the opinion
that there were " more hypocrites in the Mormon church
than out of it," that most intelligent Mormons were
really as skeptical as she was, and that business or

Mormon Maidens

Life in a Mormon Village 165

social motives were all that kept them nominally faith-
ful. She mentioned polygamy, which used to be a part
of the Mormon teaching.

"Well," said Mrs. Dutton, "I didn't like that myself.
None of the women did. If a husband took more than
one wife it always made bad feeling in a family. He
was expected to treat every wife alike; but I'm afraid
that was expecting too much; and even if he succeeded,
a woman didn't want to share her man with another
woman."

" Brigham Young had eighteen wives," said Angeline,
" and I guess he'd have liked to have a few more. There
was an aunt of mine he saw and wanted to marry; but
though her parents were good Mormons, that didn't
suit 'em. They kept her hid in a cellar for two weeks
and then sent her off to relatives in the East. Brigham
Young persuaded father that he ought to take another
wife himself; but when he told mother, didn't she make
him sashay around! She got him to move to another
town."

"My husband never seemed to have any incHnation
that way," remarked Mrs. Dutton; "and I never
coaxed him to take another wife — that's a sure thing!
If he had brought one home maybe I'd have acted like
the very old deuce as so many other women did. I'm
glad polygamy is a thing of the past."

The church is the most vital element in the village
life, and I imagined I should find the "meeting-house "

1 66 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

as they call it, a rather conspicuous building; but it
was very plain, without spire, or dome, or bell, and
though close to a chief thoroughfare, had such narrow
grounds and was so hidden by a martial company of
poplars as to be scarcely noticeable. There were three
services every Sunday — the Sunday-school in the morn-
ing, preaching for adults in the afternoon, and a young
people's meeting in the evening. As all the services are
lengthy this may seem rather strenuous, yet the day is
far from being Puritanical. There is much loitering
and visiting, the boys play ball and pitch quoits, and
the young men take the girls to ride and sit up with
them far into the night.

The Sunday that I was in the village was pleasant,
but cool, and at the morning service the interior of the
thick-walled stone church was decidedly chilly. At one
end of the main room where we gathered for the general
exercises was a platform of generous size on which was a
pulpit, a desk, and a score or so of chairs. In an adjoin-
ing corner was a small pipe organ and seats for the
choir. Rows of settees occupied most of the floor space,
and in the midst of them was a tall stove.

The prehminary exercises consisted chiefly of sing-
ing, into which the audience entered with great hearti-
ness. The songs inculcated the love of good, of nature,
home and country, but I observed an occasional hymn
in the book used that had an individuality peculiar to
the Church of the Latter Day Saints. One such ran thus :

Life in a Mormon Village 167

" I'll be a little ' Mormon,' and seek to know the ways

That God has taught his people in these the latter days.

I know that he has blessed me with mercies rich and kind,

And I will strive to serve him with all my might and

mind.

" By sacred revelation which he to us has given,
He tells us how to follow the ancient saints to heav'n.
Though I am young and little, I, too, may have forthwith
To love the precious gospel revealed to Joseph Smith.

" With Jesus for the standard a sure and perfect guide,
And Joseph's wise example what can I need beside ?
I'll strive from ev'ry evil to keep my heart and tongue,
I'll be a little Mormon and follow Brigham Young."

Here also is a verse from a song which shows the trend
of Mormon teaching in the matter of temperance.

" That the children may live long
And be beautiful and strong,
Tea and coffee and tobacco they despise,
Drink no liquor, and they eat
But a very little meat,
They are seeking to be great and good and wise."

These principles are not merely a matter of juvenile
sing-song, but are preached from the pulpit and incor-
porated in the church manuals.

I was surprised to find that the sacrament was cele-
brated in Sunday-school; but it seems this is a part of
each of the three services every Sunday. Water is used
instead of wine and each distributor carries along a tall
silver tankard from which to replenish the goblet that
passes from hand to hand. All partake, even the little
children.

1 68 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

At length we adjourned in several divisions to rooms
at the rear of the building to consider the Sunday-school
lesson. The class of adults which I joined included a
number of women who had brought along their babies
and smaller children, and the apartment was pretty
well crowded. Our topic was " The Beauties of Mother-
hood," which was treated in a characteristic Mormon
way by emphasizing the desirability of large families.
But the remarks of those who spoke covered quite a
wide range and were often original and spirited.

"Some women say they don't want children," com-
mented a bent old lady whom the villagers all knew as
Aunt Mary. "They're like some men who pretend
they don't want a wife because she'll be a lot of trouble,
but want one just the same."

The question was raised whether it was better to give
children toy animals like rabbits and bears for play-
things, or dolls. "What do you think. Sister Watson ?"
asked the young man who was our leader.

" I never approved of them animals," Sister Watson
responded. " It ain't natural to treat 'em like babies the
way the children do. I believe in dolls."

Others thought that play with toy animals might
cultivate sympathy with the dumb creatures. How-
ever, it was agreed that dolls were necessary for the girls in
order to cultivate the instinct of maternity. It was also
argued that the older children should spend considerable
time taking care of the babies in the family. But one

Life in a Mormon Village 169

woman, who rose to speak with a baby in her arms and
two other tots clinging to her skirts, said: "I don't be-
lieve I was seven years old when I had to begin to mind
a baby, and I was kept to that job for years. It didn't
seem as if I had any childhood, and I can tell you the
experience didn't make me fond of babies either. The
farther away they were the better I liked it. So I don't
think the children ought to be tied too close that way
if you would have 'em grow up wanting to have babies
of their own."

In the afternoon I was present at the preaching ser-
vice. There was nothing to attract special attention in
the way of ceremonials or ecclesiastical robing. Every-
thing was simple and business-like, and I was interested
to notice that the boy who pumped wind into the organ
did his work in plain sight and chewed gum in unison
with the motion of the pump handle. Seated on the
platform were about a dozen church officials and elders,
including the chief dignitary of the local organization,
known as a bishop. They were no diflFerent in dress or
manner from the other men present. Down below, the
audience was divided into two sections, with the mas-
culine portion on the left, and the feminine on the right.
Nearly all of the latter removed their hats, which seemed
a comfortable and sensible thing to do. The few ex-
ceptions were quite youthful, and their headgear was
apparently for exhibition purposes.

170 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

The Mormons do not have a paid ministry. To re-
ceive money for preaching seems to them obnoxious.
Individual church members address their fellows from
the pulpit, and a large proportion, either from natural
capacity or training, are able and willing to speak thus.
The chief address which I heard was given by a stalwart
big-handed young farmer. It was colloquial in manner
and had touches of humor that made ripples of smiles
run through the audience, and at the same time it
showed culture and constructive thought of a high order.

When I returned to my boarding-place my landlady
enlightened me further as to the ways of her church, in
response to a question of mine about the tithings.
"Yes," she said, "we're supposed to turn over a tenth
of all our earnings; but I don't know anybody who
pays 'em right up to the very letter. There's no com-
pulsion. It's just simply that if you don't give the
church its due you won't get the highest glory.

"I'm afraid we don't live up to any of the church
rules. For instance, one Sunday a month is a fast day,
when everybody over eight years old is expected to go
without eating from sunrise to sunset. The previous
night you should take to the bishop's storehouse a dona-
tion of flour and supplies equivalent to what you would
naturally save by fasting. But people are getting so they
don't pay much attention to the fast days. Once there
was kind of a plague in the place — diphtheria, I think it
was — and we had special prayer-meetings and fasting

The old settler

Life in a Mormon Village 171

to get rid of it. For twenty-four hours I didn't touch
any food, and I was pretty near paralyzed. Since then
I don't fast any more.

" Another thing — in the Mormon book of rules called
'The Word of Wisdom' it says you mustn't drink intoxi-
cating Hquor, or smoke, or use tea and coffee; but I
don't know how I'd get through the day if it wasn't for
my blessed coffee. None of those rules are observed at
all strictly. In the matter of smoking, lots of the boys
puff their cigarets and pipes; but as they grow older
some of them get to have sense enough to stop. My
husband told a neighbor once that his sons smoked, and
that man got so hot he could have knocked my husband
senseless. 'You're a blame Har!' he said, and he
wouldn't beheve a word of it. But later he found out
to his sorrow that it was no more than the truth, you
batcher!

"What troubles me is that things don't seem to be
improvin ' any. I know Mormons who drink, and that's
preached against almost every Sunday. Some think
the church is too strict, but I guess it allows ways enough
for people to enjoy themselves. It approves of dancing
and of having a good time generally. Yes, our young
people are terrible dancers. There's a dance once a
week at the public hall in the winter, and they go every
evening to dance at a pleasure resort near here during
the summer.

172 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

"Below that pleasure resort, in the creek, we have
our baptizings. We baptize by immersion. That's
the only proper way, and the Bible says so. I'm not
claiming that everyone will go to hell that ain't immersed
and that don't believe as we do, but I know the good
Mormons will have the front seats in heaven. The
children are all baptized when they are eight years old,
and then they are members of the church and behave
themselves, or are supposed to. If an unbaptized per-
son above that age dies, some member of the family is
usually baptized afterward in the dead person's place.
Children younger than that who die will be all right, we
think, even if they haven't been baptized. Oh, sure
they will — they're too young to sin with full knowledge
and responsibility.

"The young men as they grow up and show themselves
to be steady and faithful are made church elders. There's
one or two elders in every family, and those that are
good for anything are at some time in their life — and
perhaps more than once — appointed to go on a mission.
Mormon missionaries are preaching our religion and
making converts in every state of the Union, and all
over the world. Some of the most successful of them
are young men who don't understand any of the prin-
ciples of the gospel; but they have a gift for speaking.
They and their home people pay most of their expenses;
so we don't send the very poor. Sometimes a concert is
got up when a man is going off, and forty or fifty dollars

Life in a Mormon Village 173

raised for him; and the church pays his return fare.
Once in a while a missionary will travel in the Bible
fashion without purse or scrip, but that's not usual.
It isn't the habit to take up any collections from their
audiences. All that they ask is to have people listen to
'em. They're away two or three years; and in most of
the foreign countries a good deal of that time is spent
learning the language. The expense is quite a handi-
cap to some families; but I never knew anyone to
refuse to go. We had to sell twenty acres of our best
land to keep my husband on mission. There's always
several from this village away scattered over the earth.
Some die while they're gone, and others get diseases of
which they die soon after they return.

"The Mormons have always been ready to sacrifice
a good deal for their religion. See how they suffered
coming here when they were driven out from Illinois.
We had a pretty rough time twenty years afterward,
when I came. There was enough to eat, and the cap-
tain of the company knowed just how far our ox-teams
must go each day to reach water; but we never felt
safe. The Indians were often in sight on their ponies,
and they carried off one of our women. She was small
and slim, and she'd got tired and wore out. As she
walked along she hung behind the train, and her hus-
band went back and told her if she didn't hurry the
Indians would get her.

174 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

"'I don't care,' she says, 'I'd just as soon be with the
Indians as with you.'

"She'd hardly got the words out of her mouth when
the Indians came rushing down on them and shot the
man in the leg and caught the woman up on one of their
horses. They were off like the wind, and we could hear
her screams long after she was gone from sight. Efforts
were made to find her for years, but we never could
learn what had become of her.

"You ought to talk with old man White. He is
eighty -five years old and came here very early."

Later I had an opportunity to meet this pioneer — a
white-bearded patriarch with faded eyes and tremulous
limbs; and yet, in spite of his age and evident weakness,
I found him at his backdoor splitting stovewood. "The
first company reached this region on July 24, 1847,"
said he. "Brigham Young was the leader. He was
sick in his carriage, but he'd seen the place in a vision,
and when they come over the ridge in sight of the lake,
he looked out and says : * That's the valley where we are
to settle.'

"The prospects didn't seem very promising then.
It was a very dry year, and except along the cricks the
soil was like ashes. Some didn't think we could ever
grow any crops, and a California man was so sure of it
that he oflFered to pay one thousand dollars for the first
ear of corn we raised. I was afraid we'd all starve.
Some dug thistle roots and such things to eat. Our

Life in a Mormon Village 175

family was fortunate. We had a cow. She'd go to the
hills to browse around during the day and come back
at night to be milked, and we mowed canebrakes
for her.

" Our first houses were little cabins of logs or 'dobe.
They had flat roofs of poles with dirt thrown on. The
roofs weren't made to shed rain, because it didn't look
as if rain ever fell in this desert. But in April it began
to storm, and sometimes we had rain, and sometimes
snow. In our house we stretched an oxhide over the
top of the bed to keep that dry. There were four or five
inches of water on the floor, and we had to lay down
sticks to walk on to get to the fireplace.

"Father and me got a good crop that year, and I
threshed the first bushel of wheat raised in this state.
But there were times in both the first two summers
when we thought the big black crickets was goin ' to eat
up everything. There was such numbers of 'em that
they'd have ruined us if the gulls hadn't come by mil-
lions to eat 'em. Then a few years later we had a plague
of grasshoppers. Lots of 'em were drowned in the lake,
and they washed up along the shore in great quantities.
But there were plenty left, and we'd dig trenches and
drive 'em in and cover 'em with dirt. At night they'd
roost on the tree-trunks and fences and the posts of the
piazzas so thick as to hide the wood out of sight. In
one day they took our wheat, which was growin' nice
and green, and left the ground just as clean as a floor.

1 76 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

We had a big patch of onions, and they slicked *em out
right down to the roots. Oh, we had a good many set-
backs, and the people were poor for a long time."

But those days are now long past, and comfort and
prosperity are general. As to the Mormon Church,
there is not a little ferment and independence in the
organization. Many of its members are lukewarm or
lax, and even heretical; and the cohesiveness which
still characterizes the Church is by some observers at-
tributed largely to the unreasonable bitterness of its
Gentile critics.

Utah Notes.— Thfe name of the state is an Indian word meaning
"Dwellers in the Mountains."

In July, 1847, Brigham Young, after the long journey from Illinois through
the Western wilds, stood on Ensign Peak, called the "Mount of Prophecy,"
and announced to his followers that in the valley which lay before them
should be founded the new city of Zion, the permanent home of the Church
of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. This somewhat ponderous appellation
of the religious sect which here made their home is not in general use outside
of the denomination. In the country as a whole the Latter Day Saints are
commonly called Mormons. Up to 1871 the original settlers lived apart
from the rest of the world; but mining discoveries brought an incursion of
Gentile population, and the Gentiles have steadily grown more numerous
in Utah ever since.

Salt Lake City is fast becoming a great metropolis. It is about forty-four
hundred feet above the sea, admirably situated in a spacious valley. Some
of the mountains which encircle this valley are quite near on the north and
east, but are eighteen or twenty miles away in the other direction. The

Life in a Mormon Village 176a

streets are wide and shaded with trees. Each house in the residence section
has grounds about it, which give an effect that is cool and agreeable.

Temple Block, the Sacred Square of the Mormons, lies near the center of
the city and forms the chief object of interest to strangers. The most im-
portant Mormon buildings are the many-pinnacled temple and the great
mushroom-shaped tabernacle. Neither have any architectural charm out-
wardly. The latter has seats for eight thousand people, and can accommo-
date half as many more. With the exception of St. Patrick's Cathedral in
New York it is the costliest ecclesiastical structure in the United States.
The walls are ten feet thick. It was begun in 1853 and completed forty
years later at a cost of six million dollars. Its dome is one of the largest
unsupported arches in the world. Two of the houses that Brigham Young
shared with his numerous wives are of interest — the Lion House, with a
lion over the entrance, and the Beehive House, surmounted by a beehive-
It is well worth while to visit one of the Mormon farm villages to the
north or south of the city. If possible, be there on a Sunday to attend
church.

To see the lake go to the pleasure resort of Saltair, twenty miles from the
city. The first white man to navigate the lake's buoyant waters was General
Fremont on his way to Oregon in 1842. The Southern Pacific Railroad,
which formerly went around the north end of the lake now crosses it nearly
in the middle on a trestle twenty-three miles long, that is to be filled in most
of the distance with solid earthwork. The cost of this cut-off has been about
five million dollars. The shortening of the line amounts to forty-four miles,
and this, with the elimination of curves farther west and other improve-
ments, has resulted in a saving of seven hours in the transcontinental
journey.

Salt Lake City offers many opportunities for automobiling in all directions.
One of the particularly interesting short trips is to Heber, thirteen miles
southeast. After passing through Parley's and Provo Canyons the road
reaches an altitude of seven thousand three hundred and ten feet, and then
descends. There are several notable mountain resorts along the way. The
most unique of these is Midway Hot Pots, three miles from Heber, a curious
freak of nature akin to the Yellowstone Geys.ers. The roads are ideal,
though steep.

176b Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

In the wild eoutheastern part of the state are the three wonderful natural
bridges discovered in 1895. The largest is two hundred and sizty-five feet
high and three hundred and twenty feet in span. They are most easily
reached from the railway station of Dolores in Colorado, from which they
are one hundred miles distant.

WYOMING DAYS

IN looking at a map of Wyoming I was especially
attracted by two towns — Rock Springs and Green
River. They were not far apart and their names
were suggestive of a region of crystal waters, and pas-
toral hills, and vales with pleasant groves of trees. But
I concluded from later experience that Wyoming land-
scapes are nowhere made on that plan. You can travel
for scores of miles and find yourself all the time in a
region of scanty verdure, its more level portions much
furrowed by dry, abrupt-banked gullies, and abound-
ing in steep, flat-topped hills, and towering pillars and
castellated bluffs of strangely-worn rocks. It is a for-
saken-looking country, and the few towns are not
usually of a sort to help much in mitigating the unpre-
possessing landscapes.

At Rock Springs coal mining is the chief industry,
and the sooty, odorous smoke poured from numerous
chimneys at the mouth of the mines, and not infre-
quently overspread the town in a gloomy cloud. Early
in the morning I saw the miners going to their work,
and late in the afternoon saw them returning clad in

178 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

their grimy clothes, each with a torch stuck in the front
of his cap. Some of them had such blackened visages
when they emerged from the mines they appeared de-
cidely weird and spookish. The place was prosperous,
and there was employment for all who were willing and
efficient. Not every person, however, would fit the task
to which he aspired, as was evidenced by the following
sign in a restaurant window: "Wanted, man to sell
lunch on street at night. No dead ones need apply."

The railroad passed through the center of the town,
and on either side of the tracks was a row of saloons,
hotels, and stores, beyond which were the homes. Trees
were so few and small as to be practically non-existent,
and the town was no more vernal than was the lonely
surrounding desolation of greasewood and sagebrush.
Quite a number of cows were browsing on the village
outskirts, though what they found to feed on was a
mystery. "They're lean, now," one of the natives
observed to me; "but the grass is starting, and they'll
soon pick up and be hog fat. Every night they'll come
in just puffed up with feed. Yes, they wiggle around
in that sagebrush pretty good. They're great travellers
when they take a notion. I've got a little red cow I
bought off a man living at Whiskey Gap, sixty miles
away. After I'd had her eighteen months she con-
cluded to go back to her old home, and shegot there, too."

I asked this acquaintance about the people in the
place, and he affirmed that there was "nothing in town

Dove cotes

Wyoming Days 179

but Dagos and Greeks." So sweeping a statement
scarcely fits the facts; for even in the mines most of
the men are English-speaking. But if the latter are in
the majority, the rest are a very polyglot lot. The nation-
alities employed are many, and as one man said; "You
find a bunch of miners on the street, and every one will
be talking a different language." There is a colony of
Chinese, another of Japanese, and another of Coreans.
Of these yellow men the Japanese are rated highest as
workers. The Chinese are the most numerous, and
they have several streets of ramshackle houses with many
curious makeshift additions to the original structures.
Some of the supplementary roofs run so low that it is
evident the rooms are largely underground. On the
doors are strange red signs in Oriental hieroglyphics.

In a wide hollow neighboring the Chinese settlement
was another peculiar collection of huts. Many of the
houses were backed up against the steep banks. Often
the roofs were covered with dirt and were a continua-
tion of the bank-tops so that it was difficult to say where
the ground ended and the houses began. Helterskel-
tered among the dwellings were stables and hen yards
and dove cotes, and heaps of filth and rubbish, and
through the depths of the hollow flowed a slow, dirty
stream. There were other parts of the town decidedly
better than this, but as a rule the home environment
was rather oppressively forlorn.

i8o Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

I wondered how the children spent their spare time,
the opportunities for amusement seemed so slender, and
one day I interviewed a group of youngsters who were
paddling around in a muddy gully. They told where
the blue birds built nests in holes in the banks, and the
thrushes in the big sagebrush, and they told about the
habits of the meadow-larks, the crows, and the hawks.
"On Saturdays we go four miles out to White Moun-
tain," they said, "and we take a little gun with us to
shoot gophers and rabbits and chipmunks. Yes, sure
we do! There's cedar and willow trees out to White
Mountain, and tall grass. We carry our lunch in tin
buckets, and after we're done eating, if there's snow on
the hillside, we lay the buckets down sideways and have
a sleigh-ride on 'em. We slide, too, around home in
winter, and when there ain't sleds enough we use shovels
instead. By damming the crick we make a pond that
freezes so we can have a good time skating. When it's
summer we go barefoot and run races and go in swim-
ing. Bitter Crick is our best swimming place, and one
hole there is so deep, if you went out in the middle you'd
get drownded."

On the whole I could not help concluding that youth-
ful pleasure and excitement were to be found there in
generous measure.

The town was the railroad center for a vast, thinly-
settled country roundabout, where were occasional
ranches and little mines. Certain men made a business

Wyoming Days i8i

of carrying supplies to these outlying regions, and some
of their hauls were for a distance of nearly one hundred
and fifty miles. A driver who was making regular trips
about half that far told me it took him a week to go and
come. His usual load was seven tons. "I have three
wagons," said he, "hitched one behind the other, and
back of those is a cooster — a canvas-covered two-
wheeled cart in which I cook and sleep and carry what
things I need on the road. I drive twelve horses and go
alone. Of course, us fellers know all the roads and just
how to plan stops so the stock won't be too long without
water. In summer I hobble the horses and let 'em graze
all night. In winter I turn 'em loose just the same, only
I put blankets on 'em and scatter hay so they can all get
at it to eat. Sagebrush does me for a fire in warm
weather, but when it's cold I carry along a sack of coal."
During my stay at Rock Springs a man dropped dead
in one of the saloons. It seemed that he had been " bum-
ming his way" along the railroad. No one knew who
he was. When they examined him they found he had
been stabbed in the breast, apparently about two days
before, and the wound was the cause of his death. Here
was a tragic mystery, but the town was used to that sort
of thing and it occasioned only passing comment.
"You'd think our country here was kind of civilized,"
said an old resident, " and yet we have one or two mur-
ders in the region every month; and we have fatal or
serious accidents oftener than that. The other day one

1 82 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

of the miners lost his eyesight by the kick of a mule, and
we got up a benefit dance for him. Everybody bought
tickets whether they intended to go or not, and the affair
netted him over twelve hundred dollars. Oh, they're
a big-hearted people here!"

I tried to get my informant to tell me something of
the town's early history, but he said : " I can't talk. I'm
not well. Lately we elected a mayor here. The different
parties was all yankin' and yellin', and I'd always been
over head and ears in politics, but I was feelin' so poorly
I had to stand one side. Part of the time I was at home
in bed, and one fellow called and began to argue poli-
tics with me. He had some drink in, and his talk was
enough to make a well man sick. 'You get!' I said.
And you bet he got, too. I'm an old man now, and
though I've always been hearty till lately I guess I'm
pretty near ready to pass in my checks."

So saying, he turned away and hobbled lamely off
homeward. I was disappointed, but I afterward made
the acquaintance of other pioneers who told me what I
wished to know, "When I crossed the plains in 1868,
said one of these, "the railroad ended at Fort Steele
on the North Platte, and we camped there a few days
getting ready to start. Our company had about fifty
wagons, and the oxen that was to draw 'em was grazing
on the range within sight of the camp. But one after-
noon there come along a stampeding herd of buffaloes —
several hundred of 'em, tails up and running as fast as

A tent-dweller

Wyoming Days 183

they could go with all the old bulls in front. They
plunged right in amongst our cattle and began to bel-
low; and then the cattle began to bellow, and off they
went, every hoof of 'em, just as wild as the buffaloes.
The cowboys started in pursuit. It was four days be-
fore the last of 'em returned, and they didn't succeed in
getting all the cattle even then.

"After our journey began we had adventures every
day. There were Indians around, and we kept out-
riders five or six miles ahead and on each side watching
for trouble. Then at night we'd corral the wagons —
arrange 'em in a circle and pitch our tents in the open
space that the wagons inclosed. The cooking had to be
finished and the fires all put out before dark so the
Indians wouldn't have a chance to pick us off. But we
never saw one of 'em the whole trip, though I've no
doubt they saw us right along.

"One afternoon we come to a wagon standing by
itself loaded with all sorts of merchandise. Leaning
ag'in' a wheel was a double-barreled shotgun with one
barrel discharged, and there was a bed on the ground
beside the wagon that had bloodstains on the blankets.
Not far away, was a new-made grave with a board stuck
up at one end, and these words burned into it with a hot
iron: 'Killed by Indians.' We looked around and
studied on what we saw, and our captain said : ' That
man was never killed by the Indians. There's some-
thing crooked here. It's easy enough to see that the

184 Highways and B)rways of the Rocky Mountains

Indians wouldn't have left that gun there. Besides, the
wagon has got a whole lot of powder and shot in it,
which would be the first things they'd have wanted.
There was two men in this outfit, and one has killed the
other.'

"We went on and left the wagon as it was, and late
the next day we met three men, two on horseback, and
one on a big black mule, and all of them heavily armed.
They were going back after the deserted wagon. The
man on the mule said he was uncle to the fellow who'd
been killed. He claimed they were going to a place on
the Sweetwater where there was a gold excitement.
But the night before we come along they camped, and
while he was out herding their cattle the Indians shot
the young fellow. So he drove the cattle over the divide
and went to get help.

"And now I want to tell you the windup of that affair.
A good many years had passed, and I was living here
at Rock Springs. One day the old ladies got together
for a tea-party. They was telling their experiences, and
my mother told about the abandoned wagon and the
grave beside it that we'd seen when we crossed the
plains. Then one woman in the crowd began to cry.
She said she used to know the dead man. Him and her
was engaged to get married. He'd started with his
uncle for the mines, and he was going to marry her when
he came back.

Wyoming Days 185

"Soon after the time of the tea-partytherewas a holdup
on one of our railroads. The sheriff got after the robbers,
but they killed him and his deputy. Then some big
posses organized. They shot one robber to death, and
another they put in jail. While this fellow was in prison
he tackled the jailer in an attempt to break out. But
the jailer's wife commenced to scream and yell and
holler blue murder. Help come, and they lynched the
prisoner then and there to make sure of having no more
trouble. The man's picture was put in the papers, and
I recognized him. He had a great big nose, and was
known as 'Big-Nosed George;' and he was the same
person I'd seen riding on a mule going back to the
deserted wagon.

"There wa'n't a dozen houses in this town when I
got here in 1873. They'd begun coal mining in a small
way, and there was a company store and meat market,
and two saloons in tents and another in a little frame
dwelling. It was good hunting here in those days — I
should say it was! There were deer by the thousand
and antelope by the miUion, I guess, and they'd come
close to town. When you went out with your gun after
'em, it was more like slaughter than hunting. I've
stood right in my tracks and shot seven antelope with-
out stirring. They'd go in droves like sheep; and there
were lots of elk — sometimes hundreds in a single band.

" Hunting used to be our chief amusement, though of
course we played cards a good deal. Once in a while,

1 86 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

too, there'd be a stag dance that'd last all night, and
everyone would get drunk. But perhaps the most
curious fun was when a few of your friends made an
evening call on you. They'd be sitting around without
much life in 'em, and someone would say, 'Let's have
five minutes' roughhouse.' Then they'd all go puUin'
and tearin' at each other and tumbling around, and
some were handled pretty rude. However, they were
all friends, mind you, and not one of 'em got mad. The
dishes would be smashed and the stove turned over,
even though it was red hot. But we had to do some-
thing to break the monotony of the wilderness. After
the scramble we'd send for a kag of beer, and while
that was comin' we would clear up the wreckage.

"One of our summer amusements here is to hire a
team and go for a drive. The resort most in favor is
a ranch about twelve miles out. The man there raises
fine vegetables, and has nice water and a few trees.
The rancher likes to have the picnickers come because
they buy his lettuce and buttermilk and such things,
and it's company for him. He lies around in the shade
with 'em and always gets a share of their lunch."

I mentioned to my informant what another townsman
had said about the frequency of violent deaths in the
vicinity, and he responded: "Things of that sort you
hear of now ain't a circumstance to the happenings in
the past. Take, for instance, the massacree at the
White River Indian Agency. The savages killed the

c5

ej

Wyoming Days 187

agent and a few others, and went off to the mountains.
Then the troops come and made their headquarters at
Rawlins. That attracted a lot of toughs to the place,
and things got so bad a woman couldn't go on the street
in the evening without being insulted. There was such
a lot of drinking and gambling and killing that the
people got tired of it. So one day all the regular inhabi-
tants went out of the town a little way and held a meet-
ing and made themselves into a vigilance committee.
When they come back they hung three of the ring-
leaders of the toughs to the posts at the stockyard and
ordered the rest of the gang to clear out. Those fellows
didn't need a second telling. By and by the coroner
got around, and held an inquest, and the jury declared
that the dead men had met death at the hands of parties
unknown. After that Rawlins was a good town.

" But I want to tell you about an occurrence in Rock
Springs a few years later. Right here in the town you're
in now we had one of the darndest affairs that ever was.
There were some seven or eight hundred Chinese work-
ing in our mines then, and the competition of this cheap
labor wasn't much to the liking of the other workers.
But the worst of it was that the Chinese began to think
they could have everything their own way. They got so
insolent that if you met one of 'em on the street you'd
got to turn aside, or he'd swear at you and shove you
out of his way. The relations of the white and the yel-
low men was growin* more and more stormy when one

l88 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

day, down in a mine, a Chinaman went to work at a
place where a white man had started, and when the
white man tried to pull him away he gave a yell for help.
Others come running to the spot — some Chinese and
some whites — and there was a fight in which two China-
men were killed. Everyone hurried out of the mine
then, and word was sent to the other mines to have all
their men come out, too. In a little while the whites
had changed their clothes, got their guns, and held a
meeting at which it was decided that the Chinese must go.
The crowd then went over to the huts where the Chinese
lived and ordered them to move. But that didn't suit
the yellow men, though it was a nice afternoon in early
September, and as good a time for moving as they could
have. The whites then began to shoot in the air, but
gradually aimed lower and lower until their bullets were
going right in among the Chinamen. The assailing
party didn't make any bones about it, for they were
determined to drive the Chinese out. During the shoot-
ing they set fire to the huts. There were sixty of them,
and all went up in smoke except one. That had no
floor and wouldn't burn. Twenty-seven dead bodies
were found afterward; but most of the Chinese escaped
by scattering out over the hills. Some went east and
some went west and all of 'em struck the railroad after
a little and were picked up by a train. They wanted to
go to San Francisco and back to China, but the soldiers
came here to keep order and the Chinese were induced
to return. They weren't so sassy after that."

Wyoming Days 189

My stay at Rock Springs ended in a snowstorm. The
storm began in the evening, and the next morning the
country had all the bleakness of midwinter in its aspect.
"It did blow last night all right," remarked one man.
"It certainly did; and now the snow is melting, and
the air is so damp I could take a handful and squeeze
the water out of it."

I went by an early train to Green River. There, too,
winter had taken possession, and the ground and the
roofs were all white. In some of the yards were a few
apple trees in full bloom and bending beneath the
weight of the clinging snow, and the town for the mo-
ment was not without delicate touches of beauty. But
when the clouds broke away the sun soon played havoc
with the snow, and the place stood revealed, a grimy
railroad town in a hollow among the big bare buttes.
Yet an eflFort was apparent to live up to its name, for
little poplars had been started along the streets, and
there were grassplots in occasional dooryards. The
river, which threaded its way among the dreary sage-
brush hills and lofty bluffs of gray, red, and yellow-
colored strata, was quite idyllic in nooks here and there,
and was apt to have a bordering of cottonwoods.

As I was passing a tent on a lowland level a man
accosted me from its doorway, "You're a stranger,
ain't you.?" he inquired. "I s'pose you're takin' an
invoice of this country. It's quite a scenery to people
from back East.

igo Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

"This snow we've had will provide good feed on the
range; but it must have made the sheep men jump. A
snowfall so late in the season is pretty hard on the young
lambs. There's a terrible lot of sheep in this state, and
they're pretty profitable — ^you bet they are ! The sheep-
men get the feed for nothing, and our Wyoming moun-
tain grass is equal to Nebraska oats. The sheep have
to be watched all the time, and a herder and camp-
mover go along with every flock. They have a wagon
to live in, and the herder has a couple of dogs to help
him. He couldn't do a thing in the world with the sheep,
unless he had dogs, they're so contrary and stubborn.
You can't learn a sheep nothing. It's too muleheaded.
A dog will do more in handling a bunch of sheep than
fifty men.

"Usually the herders can take things easy, but it's a
lonesome life, and dangerous, too, sometimes. In winter
the sheep must be got together every night in a nice,
sheltered place where the wind don't blow. But per-
haps a storm will come up and the wind shift around.
Then very likely the sheep will leave the bed ground and
drift on before the storm. The herder has to get out
and try to keep 'em together, and turn 'em so they won't
get scattered and lost, or be goin' over some precipice.
The snow will be blowin' so blame bad he can't see,
and he don't know the direction he's goin' any more'n
the man in the moon. So every once in a while some
herder out on the range freezes to death.

The fishermen

Wyoming Days 191

"The worst enemies of the sheep are the coyotes.
There ain't any better judges of mutton than those
animals are, and they always pick out the choicest.
Last winter four men trapped over twelve hundred in
this county for the sake of the hides and the bounty;
but you go out in the hills and sleep over night and you
wouldn't think there were any less. They're awful
sneakin' and cunning, and you have to look out for 'em,
'specially on stormy nights. They ain't lyin' by the
stove then, but are out to rustle. That's the time they
get their harvest by picking up stray sheep, or by flying
into a herd and cutting off a bunch. They work to-
gether. You can tell that by the way they answer each
other — ^just like the roosters answer each other crowin.'
They have an unearthly yell, and if a man hears it close
enough it'll make him sit up and take notice. I don't
mind their noise myself, and I like to snug the blankets
up about me and listen to 'em. It's a plaintive, funny
kind of a sound, and they will change their notes as
fast as you could change your fingers around playing a
piano. The yelps and howls get all twisted together,
and the racket from a single coyote will last a full minute
without a pause to take breath. You'd think there were
half a dozen, and when several are together they sing a
regular old chorus."

As I was about to part with the tent-dweller he re-
marked: "I suppose, now that you've happened here
in this late snowstorm, you think we have curious

192 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

weather, but this ain't a fair sample. Take it the year
through, and our climate is about as good as they make
'em; and we have the finest fall that ever was seen,
quiet and fair for weeks together. The weather has
changed some from what it used to be. I know years ago
most every summer afternoon toward night you'd notice
a cloud about the size of your hand coming up over the
mountains. Gradually it would spread across the sky,
and you'd go to bed at night thinkin ' there'd be a down-
pour; but not a drop of rain would fall. You'd seldom
hear any thunder either, though the lightning was flash-
ing so you could pick up needles and pins, almost. Our
summers now are pretty hot at times, but we are sure
to have cool nights, and you always need a blanket over
you. So a man can depend on sleeping comfortably,
and that's a great blessing. Yes, a fellow is much better
off here on a summer night than sweating and stifled In
the hot muggy air you have In the East."

Whether his enthusiasm was fully justified might be
open to debate, but It is always a pleasure to meet a
person who believes In the superiority of his own par-
ticular region.

Note. — ^The part of Wyoming to which this chapter is devoted can
hardly claim to be ideal country for the sightseer. Yet the scenery is
often ruggedly impressive, and the towns have a certain attraction in
spite of their rather forbidding environment. The human element
at least is unfailingly interesting. These towns are the trading centers
for such herdsmen, miners, ranch-dwellers and others as venture into

Wyoming Days 193

the vast outlying wilderness, and whose labor and experiences are always
matters of discussion, and whose coming and going imparts a peculiar indi-
viduality to the Wyoming town activities. Perhaps the best time for a
visit is when the great flocks of sheep are driven to the vicinity of the settle-
ments to be sheared. That is the busiest season of the year and affords
the only opportunity for seeing the wandering flocks to advantage without
going far into the wilds.

The principal automobile route in the state is through Cheyenne, Laramie,
Rock Springs, and Green River, and continues west to Ogden, Utah.
Between the first two places named the road passes over the continental
divide at a height of about eight thousand feet. East of Rock Springs is a
particularly wild and dreary stretch of country, and the road is rough and
sandy. Laramie, is in the midst of Laramie Plains, one of the biggest grazing
districts in the United States. In summer stages ply from Laramie to North
Park, sixty miles to the south, one of the large natural parks of Colorado.
With its surrounding of lofty mountains, it offers unusual attractions to the
adventurous traveller and to the sportsman in search of big game.

XI

MOUNTAIN AND VALLEY IN MONTANA

THE biggest town in the state, and the one best
known to the world outside, is Butte, high among
the mountains near the continental divide. It
has almost one hundred thousand inhabitants, and is
old as age is reckoned in that new country, yet it is still
spoken of as a mining camp. Indeed, without the
mines, it would fade into insignificance; but, as things
are, the town is a source of enormous wealth. From it
comes one-fourth of all the world's production of copper,
as well as considerable quantities of gold and silver;
and the revenue from the Butte mines is equal to the
entire income of the government of Holland.

The town is on the long slope of a hill, the crest of
which is a steep ridge terraced with waste from the
mines, and dotted here and there with rude groups of
buildings and lofty smokestacks. That final ridge is
particularly ugly, yet counting the riches that have come
from it in the past and that still lie buried in its depths
it is the most valuable hill in the world. You might
fancy that one result of this wealth would be a beautiful
city; but the reality is far otherwise. While I was there,

In the mining district of Butte

Mountain and Valley in Montana 195

the streets, except for a few that were paved, were about
three inches deep with a black, sticky mud which threat-
ened to engulf me at every crossing. The place has its
fine buildings, but log structures still survive even in the
heart of the city, and most of the dwellings are only one
story high, closely crowded, and often shabby. Below
the town, on the low levels at the foot of the slope, are
great dark heaps of slag, and broad wastes of sand and
mud, the results of mining, both past and present.
Bordering these flats several big bare mountains rise
rugged and imposing, and in the distance is a range of
snowy peaks.

Butte began as a gold camp. The first wandering
prospectors came into the region in 1863. At first they
simply panned or rocked the silt along the streams.
The panning was done in a big shallow metal dish,
eighteen inches across and five deep with the sides
slanting sharply outward. The prospector put in a few
handfuls of soil, dipped up some water with the pan,
then shook it and gradually let the dirty water escape
over the edge. This process of dipping and washing
was repeated until he had only gold left. The washing
took only a few minutes, and the gold remained be-
hind, simply because it was heavier than the rest of the
soil. It requires good rich dirt to make panning profit-
able. Anything less than an average of ten cents to a
washing is not considered satisfactory. But on a basis
of three cents worth of gold to a pan it is worth while to

196 Highways and Bjnvays of the Rocky Mountains

do sluicing. If the miner who wishes to adopt this
method of securing gold is hard up, he will very likely
resort to rocking to get the means to pay for sluice boards
and supplies. Rocking was a California discovery.
A party of forty-niners reached a place where they
wanted to do sluicing, but no lumber was to be had.
So one of the men took a cradle he had brought along,
fitted the bottom board with riffles, and adjusted this
board so it slanted a little from the head to the foot.
At the head he fastened a coarse sieve of perforated tin,
and as dirt and water were thrown in this it screened out
the coarsest stuff. Then by rocking the cradle, as more
water was added, the gold was caught in the hollows of
the riffles, and the lighter dirt and grit flowed off. Two
men were needed for this job; one to shovel in the silt,
while the other rocked the cradle and poured in the
water taken from the stream with a long-handled dipper.
Often there remained mixed with the gold a little mag-
netic sand which was too heavy to be washed away
without also losing some of the yellow metal. To dis-
pose of it, the mixture was dried over a fire. Then a
magnet between a fold of paper was held over the gold,
and the sand would jump up and cling to the paper.
After that it was only necessary to move the paper to
one side, slip out the magnet, and the sand fell off.

The gold miners at Butte adopted for a time the usual
simple methods of securing gold, and then hydraulic
mining became common. All the soil on the lower slope

Mountain and Valley in Montana 197

of the present town site was washed off, and in some
places it was twenty feet deep.

According to an early settler with whom I chatted
copper mining did not begin until about 1880. "We
knew there was copper here," said he, "but there was
nothing very promising showed up at the surface, and
one of our richest mines was once traded off for an old
cayuse and a saddle and bridle. The more ambitious
miners neglected the hill just above the town, and froze
to death prospecting on the mountains; or perhaps they'd
escape freezing, and instead would work themselves to
death on their claims; or they'd get disgusted with their
luck and shoot themselves. Really, those that made
most in this camp were a class of miners who took life
easy — lazy old bachelors, who were so shiftless they
didn't care to exert themselves. They'd pound rocks
just enough to get and hold some claim that no one else
would have, and the rest of the time they loafed in their
cabins. But it finally commenced to dawn on them that
these copper claims was goin' to be valuable some day,
and pretty soon the owners were rich. The money just
piled in on 'em — they couldn't keep away from it.

"As soon as copper began to be mined in quantities
some big smelters were built here. The smelting was
done by roasting the ore on the ground with wood fires.
That set free fumes of arsenic and sulphur, which filled
the air all through the region. By George! it was fear-
ful. The place was a regular hell with the smoke and

igS Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

the smells; and the arsenic killed all the grass and trees
for miles around. There was just bare earth and rocks
left. It doessn't seem reasonable that such fumes could
be very conducive to human life, but we weren't affected
the way the vegetation was. People would cough, and
some of 'i?m would tip handkerchiefs over their mouths
arid noses, The smell was worst when the air was
dryest. Then it would pretty near cut your lungs right
out, and at times I'd find myself wheezing as if I was
about to be suffocated,

"Great volumes of smoke were always rolling up
from the smelters, and I've known that smoke to settle
down and hang here for weeks. When you climbed up
above it and looked down you saw it lying in the valley
like a blue lake. When there was fog, that and the
smoke would get mixed, and be so thick you'd bump
into people as you walked on the street, and the hack
horses had to be led from the depot to the hotels. The
sun would be hidden from sight completely, and if you
got under an arc light it would seem like just a little
spark above you, and you'd wonder what it was. Team-
sters going outside of the town would get lost, and they'd
unhitch their horses and hunt their way back to the
stable. It might be a week before they'd find the wagon.
If the weather was cold, that infernal smoke penetrated
your clothes and seemed to make it colder. The gloom
and the odors and the desolation were so bad that at
last the people got up a crowd and took teams and went

Moufttain and Valley in Montana 199

and smothered the smelter fires with dirt. The mayor
was with *em doing his part to help; and after that the
owners of the . smelters moved into another valley, and
built 'em so they wouldn't turn the region there into a
desert as they had here. Now the poison is gradually
getting washed out of the soil and we're trying to have
lawns and trees and flowers again. It's not yet a town
that strangers like at first sight, and if they settle here
they declare they'll move away just as soon as they get
the means. But the wages are high, and life is freer
and easier than in most places, so that people who get
used to Butte are never satisfied to live anywhere else.
"Until 1885 the buildings were mostly of logs, though
some places of business were faced up with lumber to
give 'em a better appearance. Sunday was the liveliest
day of the week. All the prospectors came in from the
country then, every store was open, and the gambling
houses were running full blast. You could look right
into the gambling dens from the street and see the
twenty dollar gold pieces stacked up on the tables. The
early miners were Americans as a general thing. They
were frontiersmen who had run away from too much
civilization. At their former homes the folks had got
too strict, too religious or something, and these men
felt they had to fly away as far as possible. There was
nothing mean or stingy about 'em. If you saw a fellow
you knew who wa'n't treating to drinks or spending no
money, you knew he must be broke, and when it was

200 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

mealtime you'd say, 'Well, Jack, you ain't e't yet —
come on and eat with me.'

"They were a liberal and hospitable people, and
nobody starved in this country. They'd divide their
last mouthful with you — yes and divide their bed with
you, and it made no difference whether there were gray-
backs in it or not. Every cabin had a buckskin latch-
string, and it was always out. They never thought of
locking any doors in a mining camp. Supposing you
were off in the mountains and hungry, and you came to
a cabin where no one was at home — ^you'd step in and
help yourself to food, cook it, wash the dishes, and go
about your business.

"We had no holdups then — at least not of individuals;
or if there was, the vigilance committee got after the
party they thought was responsible and hung him.
Now you can't even leave an ax outdoors but that some-
one will borrow it and forget to return it, and there's
lots of petty larceny thieves who steal just to be put in
jail and fed.

"As a rule the miners are spendthrifts and always
have been; but their worst enemy today is the credit
system. For instance, young people marry and start
housekeeping, and when they find they can get trusted
for what they buy they begin to live a little beyond their
means, and by and by they no longer have any honor
about paying their debts. It doesn't matter what their
income is. If they got ten dollars a day they'd be broke

•a.

Mountain and Valley in Montana 201

before the next pay day came just the same. The old-
timers spent their own money, but they didn't sponge
on other people. Whatever their faults, they were good,
sincere men. That is one reason why they weren't
religious. It's about as 'twas with me when I was a
boy. I wanted to be pious, and I'd try to pray; but it
would flit through my mind that Pete Mason and I was
goin' fishin' on Sunday, and I give up. It didn't seem
right to pretend to be religious when I was doin ' things
I knew religion didn't approve of.

" I've spent a good deal of my time here placer mining
in the mountains, and men are still washing out gold in
that way within fifteen or twenty miles of here. The
gold hunter leads a great life. There's a romance about
it to be found in nothing else. You're in close touch
with nature, and the gold you get isn't just an ordinary
commodity. It was made in the form you found it by
the power that made the world. A dollar of it seems
worth five gained in any other way. I didn't use to
notice the time go by. When night came, after working
hard all day, I'd wish I could keep right on. If we had
dry weather so there wasn't water enough for working I'd
take my gun and go after game. I was hearty and well.
A man never could feel better under any conditions.

" Some of those fellows prospecting among the moun-
tains are now old men. If they make money they drink,
gamble, speculate — any way to get rid of it. One of 'em
that I know is over seventy, but when he gets a dram or

202 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

two of nose paint he thinks he's one of the boys, and
then he don't care how the money goes. He and his
pardner have a small ranch where they raise a little
wheat and stuff, and after working through the week
they get a jug of liquor, bet five dollars as to which is
the best marksman, and spend Sunday shooting at a
target and emptying the jug. He went East to his rela-
tives a while ago intending to stay with 'em the rest of
his days. But he was soon back. 'That sort of life
would kill me,' he said. 'I couldn't stand it.' "

To see Montana in another aspect I visited the Galla-
tin Valley known as "the garden spot of the state." It
is about thirty miles long and half that broad. Much
of it is as level as a floor, but along the borders are big
softly rounded hills with a background of impressive
mountain ranges. The soil is justly celebrated for its
fertility, and prosperity is general. Many of the farmers
stay on their farms only during the season that the crops
need attention and spend the winter in homes that they
own "in town," which usually means Bozeman, the
metropolis of the valley. Bozeman is, however, not
much more than a snug country village, embowered in
trees and quite suggestive of sociable serenity. The
educational advantages of the town are one of its at-
tractions; for in addition to the schools usually found
in any good-sized community there is a college. "The
biggest part of the valley children graduate from the
high school," an acquaintance remarked to me, "and

Mountain and Valley in Montana 203

those that want to make something besides farmers
out of theirselves go to college afterward." Often the
young people move to town in the autumn and attend
school and do their own housekeeping, while their par-
ents continue at the farm till the harvest is ended.

On the uplands a good deal of dry farming is being
done, and excellent crops are produced where formerly
it was thought only grazing was possible. Dry farming
does not mean that crops can be raised in soil devoid of
moisture, but that by proper treatment the soil is made
to conserve its moisture for crop nourishment instead of
giving it off into the air. The ploughing is done in the
spring. Then the land is thoroughly disked and har-
rowed, and after every rain it is harrowed again. By
keeping the surface pulverized a sort of blanket is formed
which prevents the moisture from escaping. Finally
fall wheat is sown and the land then takes care of it-
self until harvest time.

There were still occasional straw stacks around the
farmhouses and here and there in the fields. " We won't
get shet of them this year," said one farmer. " Usually
the stock tear 'em to pieces and eat considerable, but
last fall the feed was so good, in the pastures we didn't
use no roughness hardly."

On one of my rambles a shower drove me into a
farmhouse, and I sat down in the kitchen. "This is
Monday," said Mrs. Farmer, "and I don't like to see
it rain, because Monday is our day for washing if it's fit

204 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

weather. Then, too, they say that rain on Monday
means rain all the week, or three days anyway. I heard
the robins singing their rain song last night, and this
storm is no more than I was expecting. I wish we could
have some pretty weather till the crops are in. It's
been so wet we couldn't plough."

I mentioned that I had met a man on the road who
told me the moon was about to change, and therefore
the weather would change also.

"Yes," said she, "but did he notice that every change
of moon this month was on Friday ? That's something
never's been heard of before. So I think it will rain
every day this month. But goodness sakes! I hope not.
My husband ketched an awful bad cold last week, and
I can't keep him in out of the wet the best I can do. It
might develop into pneumony. That's the most dreaded
disease we have here. People seldom get over it, the
climate is so high. There's one thing we don't have
though, and that's malarial fever. We asked about it
when we moved from Missouri, and they didn't know
what 'twas — never had heard of it. Oh, I like this
country fine!

"Did you notice the bushes along the roadside all
white with blossoms ? They'll be loaded with berries
later — sarvice berries. You can take your hands and
just rake them off. They're awful good to eat raw —
healthy, you know, and you can sell 'em in the stores,
or make 'em into butter. Choke cherries make good

Mountain and Valley in Montana 205

butter, too. You cook 'em and then take and rub 'em
through a cullender. After that sweeten to taste and
cook again till the butter is right thick. People just go
crazy for choke cherries here. They come out from the
town to pick 'em, and they claim they're the finest kind
of medicine; but my goodness they're dreadful puckery
things to eat raw, and you dassent drink no sweet milk
after eating 'em. If you do, you'll sure be made sick.
Raspberries and currants grow in the brush along the
streams, and you can find gooseberries in the canyons
— ^just quantities of 'em. Up on the mountains there
are plenty of huckleberries in a good year. I think
they're the best fruit that grows. You can cook 'em
and can 'em up any old way, and they keep good, no
matter how you fix 'em."

About this time the man of the house came in, and we
had dinner. While we were eating he remarked on the
shortness of their seasons. " I can't grow corn," he said,
"except a little sweet corn for roas'in' years; and that
hardly ever matures enough so it can be used for seed.
The nineteenth of August last year we had a killin'
frost all over this valley, pretty much. It damaged the
oats so I don't reckon some men cut theirs at all; and
the spring wheat got such a setback that it was naturally
ruined and was no account afterward. The frost nearly
got away with the gardens, too. Oh, it was bad!

"When I first came here I was afraid the winters
would be too harsh for us, but the cold is still and dry

2d6 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

and don't go right through a fellow as it does in a climate
that's windy and damp. Yes, this country suits me,
and when it comes to grain, hay and potatoes, the Gal-
latin Valley can't be beat."

The enthusiasm for that particular region which this
man voiced was shared by most of his neighbors, and
they were apt to feel that they could never be contented
elsewhere. One such family with whom I made my
home for a time occupied a huddle of one-story, dirt-
roofed log cabins. They were people of refinement,
and well able to afford a dwelling of more modern type,
but they had become attached to their home in its primi-
tive, pioneer form. The buildings were in a little
meadow with steep protecting hills on three sides, while
on the fourth side were level lowlands sweeping away
to lines of distant mountains. Just back of the cabins
was a grove of big cottonwoods, and a shallow creek
lingered through the meadow, and gathered at one place
in a pond where the ducks and geese liked to paddle
about. The nearest village was four miles distant, and
the road thither was a most erratic sort of a byway. It
forded the creek a dozen times, and encountered numer-
ous barbed-wire gates which must be unfastened and
dragged aside every time anyone passed through.

The log cabins were rude, but had a substantial and
cosy simplicity that was quite pleasing. "We ap-
preciate 'em most in winter," said the owner. " They're
much warmer than a frame house."

Mountain and Valley in Montana 207

We were sitting in the living room. The logs and
boards of the roof had been whitewashed, and the walls
were pasted over with newspapers. It was lighted by
two small windows. The floor was roughly boarded,
but the family regarded the cracks and bumps with
complaisancy, it was so much better than the dirt floors
of earlier days. In one corner was a cookstove accom-
panied by a big red woodbox. Many utensils and arti-
cles of clothing hung on the walls.

My host's chief criticism of the vicinity was that
fruit trees did not flourish. "When I was a boy back
in Ohio," said he, "there was a peach tree in every
corner of our Virginia rail fences, and I'd sit on the
fence and eat the peaches till I fell off. After I grew up
I began to move on west, and in 1859, I took a farm in
Iowa to work on shares, two-thirds of the crop for me
and one-third for the owner. I put in oats, corn, and
wheat. They all turned out fine, but I had trouble doing
the harvesting and marketing to advantage. For cut-
ting the wheat and oats I gave my share of the wheat;
and then for threshing and delivering the grain I gave
my share of the oats. That left the corn. There was a
hundred acres of it, and when I shucked it I had to have
a regular village of corn cribs to store it in. However,
in order to sell it, the corn must be drawn a long distance,
and then I couldn't sell it for money, but had to take
Cottonwood fence boards in exchange. Those boards
would warp off my wagon before I got back, and when

2o8 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

I nailed them on to the fence posts they'd warp the nails
out at one end and twist over so you could nail from the
other side. I got discouraged, and I finally swapped
my corn for a watch. The watch was a pinchbeck
affair that never did run, and later when I come across
a man who hadn't any watch I asked him what he'd
give for it. ' Five dollars,' he said, and I sold it to him.
After keeping it a few months hung on his wall he paid
two dollars and a half to have it repaired, and then it
wouldn't go.

"There was quite a noise about Pike's Peak at that
time, and in the spring I left Council Bluffs for Denver.
We had ten men in our company, and six ox-wagons.
Lots of other outfits were on the road, and we always had
some of 'em in sight. Once in a while we'd overtake a
party that was having a fight. Perhaps four or five men
owned a single wagon, and some were kind of faint-
hearted and didn't want to go any farther. I've seen
'em cut a wagon in two, and make it into carts, and one
cart would go on, and the other return. I recollect one
big Georgian on the back track. He was barefoot and
dilapidated, and we laughed at him. 'You'd laugh out
of the other side of your mouth,' he said, 'if you was me.
I never was away from home before. I've been to
Denver. It's a new camp — ^just a few houses scattered
over the sand, and things looked so disagreeable I
thought I'd go back.'

A proble

Mountain and Valley in Montana 209

"Our party went into the mountains looking for gold,
and in one place the first pan showed two dollars and
forty cents worth. Then we whipsawed boards enough
to make a sluice. The sawing was done by fixing up
two tall sawhorses on which we mounted a log, and
then, one man standing up above, and one down below,
we'd work the saw. Sluicing in that particular spot
didn't prove to be profitable. We were living in a little
bush shack made by setting up two crotched stakes with
a pole laid on them from which spruce boughs were
slanted down to the ground on one side. The spruce
turned water pretty near as good as a shingle roof. A
fire out in front served for cooking and kept us warm.
While we were there three fellows came along who had
only one blanket between them, and just what food
they could carry in their pockets. So they e't off us;
and they went up the opposite side of the crick and lo-
cated where there was a pocket from which they took
out nearly two hundred thousand dollars.

" By fall of the next year I succeeded in getting to-
gether eleven hundred dollars and I returned to the
states and blowed it in before the winter was over.
Then I came to Montana. I was still gold-hunting, but
the claims didn't amount to anything here, and in No-
vember I settled down on this farm. The next spring
I did some of the first ploughing ever done in Montana.
I thought this was the most beautiful wild country I'd
ever seen. There was game running in every direction.

210 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

and the antelope were so thick you could shoot 'em
right from your cabin; for they'd come up quite close
out of curiosity. They were bound to investigate any-
thing new. If you lay down on the ground and stuck up
a colored handkerchief on your ramrod, you'd soon
have 'em within shooting distance.

"There was plenty of good grazing — buffalo grass
and bunch grass growing everywhere. A cow could lie
down and get more feed than she could now walking
around. I've wintered cattle on the range that'd sell
for beef in May, and they would be fat, too. Timber
wolves bothered us considerable, and they are still doing
lots of damage in the northern part of the state. They
mostly kill colts and calves, but a bunch of 'em together
will down anything, if they're hungry.

"I planted six acres my first year here. Potatoes
were the main crop, and the yield was tremendous. As
soon as I got 'em dug I loaded one hundred and eighty
bushels on a couple of prairie schooners, leaving a little
space under the bow of the canvas top for a bed. I
hired a man to go with me, and we hitched up with five
yoke of oxen to each wagon in order to get over the
seventy miles of rough trail to Helena. Just before
starting I used the last of my flour to bake a pone of
bread. The baking was done in a Dutch oven — a shal-
low iron kettle with stout legs. You set it on the coals,
and it had a rimmed cover so you could heap coals on
top. I've baked as fine bread in a Dutch oven as you

Mountain and Vallq' in Montana 211

could ask to see— light as a cork. On the third night
we made our last camp about half a dozen miles from
Helena. By and by I noticed some smoke curling up off
in the brush, and I went over there and found a man
who had a little supply of flour. He was willing to sell
me five pounds for five dollars, and he measured it out
in a tin cup that wouldn't hold much more'n a half-pint
and called each cupful a pound. Next morning we had
fry-pan bread and bacon for breakfast. To make the
bread I stirred up the flour with a little yeast powder
and cold water. Then I greased the fry-pan with a
piece of bacon, turned in the dough, and spread it out
over the bottom. It rose and filled the pan, and when
I got it well fried on one side, I flopped it over to give
the other side a chance.

" I sold my potatoes in Helena to two grocery houses
at fifty-two cents a pound, and got a whole bootleg full
of gold dust for them. Gold dust was the common cur-
rency in the mining country, and everybody had a pair
of balance scales for weighing it. No one would think
of buying or selling anything for less than twenty-five
cents. Now the minimum price is five cents, and I
think that's low enough. I went into a store in town
the other day and they gave me two of those blame
pennies in change. They were a nuisance. Some of
the big stores for an advertisement are shoving pennies
out all the time. The merchants make a price with odd
cents to have it appear they've trimmed the profit to the

212 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

limit, but the next week they cut the price previously
made twenty per cent and are getting rich even then.

" Potatoes hadn't been seen in Helena for a long time,
and the people were hungry for 'em. I saw a man pick
out a good big one and ask the price. The merchant
weighed it and said, ' Just a dollar.'

"So the fellow handed over the cash and went off
with the potato in his pocket. For that year's crop of
potatoes and onions I got sixteen thousand dollars.

"Potatoes were a luxury and so were most other
things, but I think we were worst off in the matter of
tobacco. It was so costly that if a man had a little in
his pocket he wouldn't take it out in public for fear
someone would ask him for a chew; but he'd go way
off on the prairie to take a bite. Often you couldn't
get any but mouldy, strong old stuff that they called
Indian tobacco, because it was chiefly used in trading
with the Indians for furs.

"It was only the first year that potatoes were a bo-
nanza for me. A while afterward I tried dairying and
kept thirty or forty cows. The butter sold for a dollar
and a quarter a pound; but later the price dropped to
six bits, and I wouldn't bother with the cows any more.

"One season I joined a freighting outfit. There were
fifty men in the company. I had six yoke of oxen
hitched to two wagons, one wagon trailing behind the
other. We'd corral the wagons at night — arrange 'em
in a circle with the back wheel of one wagon chained

Mountain and Valley in Montana 213

to the front wheel of the next. If It was in a place where
there was no water, and the cattle would be inclined
to go off in search of it we'd keep 'em inside the circle
of the wagons. But as a general thing we night-herded
'em — ^that is, let 'em graze with three men watching,
and changed the guard at midnight. The first part of
the night the cattle would be feeding pretty steady, and
after that they'd lie down and get up by spells and
wander over quite a little territory. Once when we
were camped at Fort Gilpin, which was just an old
stockade, about fifty Indians, each lashed onto a black
horse that shone like a raven, came sailing over the
sagebrush. They wore their feather bonnets and were
smeared with red and yellow war paint. One of our
men was killed and a couple wounded, and the savages
got away with sixty of our cattle.

"Another time I saw a fight between two parties of
Indians — probably a hundred on a side. They were a
cowardly outfit and would just circle around on their
ponies and yelp as they approached each other. But
when they came within about two hundred yards they
swerved off. They were always on the move, never stop-
ping for a moment. I could see their arrows glisten in
the sun, but it looked like they didn't get near enough
to kill anyone. I believe each party secured one scalp.

" Besides Indians to keep a man uneasy there were a
lot of bad whites who floated in from Nevada and Cal-
ifornia, and in 1864 the road agents elected their chief

214 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

as sheriff of the whole territory. They were going to
have things their own way, but a Vigilant Committee
organized and hunted him out and hung him. He was
a fine-looking fellow, as smart as steel, and not thirty
years of age.

"This country is in most ways all right now, and any
industrious man of good habits can make money here.
In fact, nearly all our farmers are free from debt and
have money in the bank. Isn't it astonishing the
changes and inventions and wonders that have come to
pass in the last fifty years. If a man at the beginning of
that period had prophesied what's taken place they'd
have locked him up. I'd like to live fifty years more
just to see how things would be then."

Note. — ^Butte is interesting to the traveller as the greatest silver-pra-
ducing center in the United States, and the biggest copper mining camp in
the world. It has but a single industry, and every inhabitant is either
directly connected with the mines or in some way caters to the wants of
those who are thus employed. The region has a somewhat sinister aspect due
to the fact that the fumes of the smelters have blasted nature's greenery for
ten miles around, but the grandeur of the mountains remains, and the mine
dumps and tall chimneys on the crests of the hills form striking features of
the landscape.

Helena, the capital of the state, with not much over ten thousand inhabi-
tants, is among the wealthiest cities of its size in the world. Gold to the
value of forty million dollars has been taken from Last Chance Gulch which
runs through the city.

The soil in some of the valleys is unsurpassed for agricultural purposes,
and potatoes are raised that weigh two and a half pounds each.

Various interesting automobile trips can be made in the state, especially
from Helena as a center.

XII

MAY m THE YELLOWSTONE

THE Yellowstone National Park is a remnant of
the untamed wilderness which a few decades ago
included all the country west of the Mississippi.
It is, in fact, almost the only easily accessible portion of
genuine wilderness now left to us, where the woods and
streams and the creatures that inhabit them are just as
they would be in undisturbed nature. There are other
features, to be sure, that give it individuality, and that
have made its fame world-wide, but I think its wild-
ness is its most unique charm.

The northern gateway is the favorite entrance for the
multitude of visitors whom the Park attracts, and there
you find a rude little town named Gardiner. I reached
this place one rainy day when the mountain crests and
hilltops around were hidden by the overhanging clouds,
and the somberness of the weather made the hamlet
appear even more forlorn than usual. Its most preten-
tious portion consisted of a long row of saloons with a
few stores and hotels among them, lined up close to the
Park entrance. They were all of wood, and only a story
or two in height. The helter-skelter of lesser struc-

2i6 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

tures which made up the rest of the town stood amid
rocks and sagebrush, and many of them had log walls.
It was a Wild West village, seemingly lying in wait
there, like a spider alert for flies.

The tourist season was still a fortnight off, though
May was nearing its end; for the Park is a lofty moun-
tain fastness where winter holds sway during the greater
part of the year. I could therefore only find a public
conveyance for the five-mile climb from Gardiner to
Mammoth Hot Springs. The vehicle had no canopy,
and its occupants were exposed to the chilly onset of
the storm, and to splashes of mud from the wheels and
the horses' hoofs.

My fellow passengers were three Irish stonemasons,
who talked with a brogue and called every wild creature
they saw a "son of a gun," and who compared the
scenery to that of the Lakes of Killarney in their native
Erin. Our road followed up the winding valley of a
mountain stream which careered down its rocky chan-
nel in a foaming torrent. As we went higher the rain
turned to snow, and we had around us lofty whitened
mountains looming dim amid the falling flakes; and
then we came to a nook in the upland that gave footing
for a hamlet of government barracks, hotels, and ac-
cessory buildings.

After I had found shelter and warmed myself, I went
for a walk and climbed the big steep hillside near by,
where for a half mile or more the hot springs well forth

May in the Yellowstone 217

in many scattered spots. The springs are not simply
hot water gushing up from the ground. They are
architects and builders; for the water is laden with
lime which forms series of dainty basins rising terrace
on terrace, or decorates the slopes with shelving con-
volutions that in places drop almost perpendicularly,
and again are nearly level. Another marvel of the lime
is the color. Some portions of the formation are pure
white, and some are gray or creamy, while still others
are yellow, orange, or deep brown, or some shade of
green. These fountains with the dripping rims, though
often quite massive, are not very permanent; for the
limestone is soft, and when a spring shifts its outlet the
abandoned terrace soon begins to crack and crumble.
But so long as a basin is supplied with the subterranean
water its contour is unfailingly graceful, and even the
details are very charming in their flutings and corruga-
tions. Sometimes the water boiled with a bubbling
vigor, but as a rule it gently simmered. Here was a
nectar of nature's brewing in chaliced cups of a size
suited to the gods and goddesses of mythology. The
steaming contents, delicately blue in tint, were ap-
parently just warm enough to be satisfying and
comforting.

In the neighborhood of the springs the snowflakes
melted as fast as they fell, and numbers of robins and
other birds hopped around on the bare spots as if to
warm their feet. The air was gray with the storm, and

2i8 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

I could barely see the mountains looming roundabout.
Near at hand were occasional straggling clumps of ever-
green trees adorned with spotless festoons of snow; and
the white earth, and the silence, broken only by the soft
rustle of falling flakes and the equally soft bubbling
and steaming of the springs, was full of mystery. Once
a jack rabbit leaped nimbly away, and again and again
a squad of deer rambled across my path.

The next morning the storm was nearly over, and
when I looked out of my window at the hotel I saw the
footprints of a bear in the snow down below, and noticed
that the creature had tipped over some garbage barrels
at the back door. An hour later, when I started on a
twenty-mile walk to the Norris Geyser Basin, the sun
was breaking through the clouds, and the snow on the
evergreen boughs was beginning to drip. The birds
were singing, and as I plodded along the deer looked
inquiringly at me from the roadside thickets, and in
one of the high meadows I saw two or three herds of elk.

For the first part of the way there were wild canyons
that yawned beside the trail, and great mountain cliffs,
but later the route was rather monotonous forest with
here and there an open glade or a little lake. The snow
lay six or eight inches deep, and it was slow work toiling
along the unbroken roadway. At length I met a
mounted soldier, and later two government mule teams,
and the path they broke through the snow made the
walking somewhat easier. Yet the muddiness increased,

May in the Yellowstone 219

and the endless slop, slop, slop of my footfalls was de-
cidedly wearisome. I appreciated the companionable
mileposts by which I was able to measure my progress.
Nor could I complain of the road, except for the snow
and mud. It receives the best of care from the govern-
ment, and in the dry days of midsummer a score or two
of sprinklers, just such as one sees on the city streets,
are busy laying the dust, each going over an allotted
distance.

One of the wayside streams was interrupted by fre-
quent snaggy beaver dams. The beavers have become
numerous in the Park during recent years; but they
prey on the fish too ravenously to be altogether desirable.

As I went on signs of the underworld heat that pro-
duces so many curious spectacles in the region were
increasingly frequent. Here and there were blasted
patches of ground where a hot spring welled up, or
where steam issued from holes and crevices, or perhaps
there was simply a belching of sulphurous fumes. At
one point was the "Frying Pan" — a muddy hollow
containing several shallow pools in a constant sizzle,
from which a succession of big bubbles were floating
away down a tiny rill. Another striking sight was what
appeared to be a burning mountain with many shreds
of smoke rising from among the trees that had been
killed by the fumes and heat; and thence came a medley
of muffled rasping sounds as if the gnomes were run-
ning a sawmill in the depths of the earth.

220 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

When I reached Norris I found a barren circular
valley full of bubbling water-holes and spouting foun-
tains. Drifting steam was rising from these and from
many pools and hot streams, and from cauldrons of
mud at the borders of the Basin, and the air was laden
with stifling odors. Perhaps the most appalling feature
was a blast of steam that comes with terrific force from
a red-throated crevice. Its hoarse voice thrills the valley
unceasingly. Many of the water-holes erupt at more or
less regular intervals. Up goes a burst of water accom-
panied by clouds of steam, but the tumult is soon over,
and the fountain subsides to prepare for a new explo-
sion. There are several other geyser clusters farther
south, and it is at one of these known as the Upper
Basin that the geysers are seen at their best. Here is
Old Faithful which spouts every hour, and the water
column is thrown over one hundred feet in the air,
retains its height a few moments, and then after many
weakening rallies sinks hissing and rumbling into its
brown cone, leaving all the rocky earth about glistening
and steaming with the hot water. Of course such a
spectacle is impressive, and so are all the other varied
manifestations of subterranean power, yet much of this
is not beautiful, but simply uncanny.

Most of the Park consists of a high plateau near the
backbone of the continent that averages seven thousand
five hundred feet above the sea level. The tourist sea-
son ends September 15th, and winter soon puts a stop

An upland brook

May in the Yellowstone 221

to all wagon travel. At Norris, the big hotel was still
vacant except for the family of the winter keeper, the
members of which had led a lonely life for the last few
months. "But the snow was less deep than usual,"
said the keeper as we sat by the fire in the evening.
" We only had four feet on a level, and we got our mail
mighty near every week. The keepers farther in the
Park didn't fare so well, especially the man at the
Canyon. There's only him and his wife, and he didn't
have any soldiers stationed close by to keep him com-
pany like we do. None of us can find much work to be
busy about, and those two pretty near went crazy.
What we fear most is sickness. A year ago a keeper's
wife was sick, and the soldiers put her on a toboggan
and dragged her down to Mammoth Springs.

" Everybody goes on skees here in winter. I can get
into a sweat on those even with the thermometer fifty
below zero. They work good when it's cold. The snow
won't stick to nothin' then, but a good many days it
softens some, and then we can only use skees to advan-
tage early in the morning or late in the afternoon."

I spoke to the keeper about some of the animals I had
seen, and of the numerous footprints of wild creatures
I had observed in the snow and mud. "Yes," he said,
"we have here about every animal that'll live in a cold
climate — bears and buffaloes, moose, wildcats, lynx,
badgers, big-horns, red, black, blue, and silver foxes,
mountain lions, eagles, and lots of other creatures. They

222 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

claim there ain't any wolves ; but I think I saw one once.
He snapped his jaw at me and run off, but it was in a
snowstorm, and I didn't see him real plain. The gov-
ernment tries to kill off any such animals that are very
destructive to the other creatures. Mountain lions are
bad that way. They ketch a good many of our deer and
elk. I suppose there's quite a lot of 'em in the park;
but you might stay here a hundred years and never see
one — they're just that sly. However, they see you and
will follow you, stopping when you stop and going on
when you go on-

"Nearly all the animals are much more plenty than
they were when I began living in the Park in 1883. I
didn't see any deer for a long time. They were so wild
they kept back in the woods. Now they're so tame I
often feed 'em out of my hand. One of the most
interesting things I know of is to see a deer kill a snake.
It will leap into the air, put all four feet within a few
inches of each other and light on the snake so quick
that the snake don't know what's happened. The deer
is off at once, and then makes the same kind of a jump
again and again, till its sharp hoofs cut the snake right
in two. A deer will kill every snake it comes across.

"One queer creature we have in the Park is a wood
rat — a tremendous big fellow with a flat tail as large
around as your finger. It Ukes to beat on the floor with
that tail, and makes as much noise as you could with a
stick. For a nesting place it prefers some dark loft

May m the Yellowstone 223

where it uses all sorts of rubbish in building a nest that
would fill a barrel. Whatever it can get hold of that is
not too heavy or bulky it carries off. We might leave
our shoes and socks here by the stove, and perhaps one
of those rats would carry 'em off. But the chances are,
if it wasn't disturbed, it would bring *em back the next
night.

"The worst nuisance we have though in the way of
wild varmints is the bears. They're raising Cain all
the time, and there's getting to be lots of 'em. The
grizzlies are the bosses. When a bunch of the cinna-
mons and blacks are together at a hotel garbage heap
they all get up and run fit to kill themselves if a grizzly
comes around. Some of the bears are big fellows that
have a footprint the size of a pan. About this time of
year they're beginning to fish in the small streams.
They'll lie down at the edge of the water and watch
perfectly still, and then give a slap that'll throw a trout
way out on the land.

"They make lots of trouble for tourists with tents and
wagons. I was camping in the Park one time, and a
bear smelt my provisions and come right after 'em. It
was night and dark, and every time I heard the bear
prowling around I'd throw something at it, and I had
to spend all the next day picking up the articles I'd used
for bombarding the creature.

"I used to have a mule that liked nothing better than
to chase a bear up a tree. Then he'd back up to the

224 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

foot of the tree and wait for a chance to kick the heal
when it came down. Oh, the mules like to fight a bear.
They'll run one off into the timber any time.

"The bears are not at all dangerous as a general
thing. I threw a stone at one the other day, and whop !
it hit him a bat side of the head, and away he went.
Sometimes I've caught a bear by the tail when he had
his head in a slop can. He'd leave the can in a hurry
and start for the woods, and perhaps I'd chase him
about half a mile just for fun. But if the bear stopped,
I'd go the other way. One night I opened the door to
go out and almost tumbled over a grizzly with eyes as
big as dinner plates. I tell you I broke and run into the
house over the tables and chairs and things. Unless I
can see and have a notion of what a bear is planning to
do, I don't take any chances monkeying with him.

"You want to look out about coming to close quarters
with a bear that has cubs. If you get between a cub and
its mother, the first thing you know the old bear is onto
you, and you don't last long. There was a tourist come
to the Park once makin' his brag that he was goin' to
have his hands on a bear. That's a kind of hobby with
some people — they want to get their hands on a bear.
The men here told him he'd better not, but that didn't
make any difference. So one day he and his wife saw
a bear with two cubs, and they gave chase. One cub
ran up a tree, and the man touched it as it was climbing.
He'd succeeded in his stunt, but the old bear didn't know

May in the Yellowstone 225

that was the end of the game. She went for him and
knocked him down. His wife drove the bear off with a
club, but the man was clawed up so bad he died soon
after he returned to his home in the East.

"Another fellow who had a hankering to put his
hands on a bear was a Chinaman cook up at the Lake
Hotel. If a bear happened around when he was off
duty he'd go and chase it. I was in the woods up in that
region one time when I heard a bear comin' rippity-
dash through the timber, and it was sure tearin' up
the brush; and behind it was the Chinaman hollerin'
'Hoop! hoop! hoop!' The bear started up a tree, and
the Chink grabbed it by a hind leg. But the bear turned
and gave him a swipe with its paw that cut his arm
plumb to the bone. He'll carry the scar to his grave."

The keeper's wife had joined us while we were talk-
ing, and she now remarked: "I think bear meat is just
lovely. I'd as soon have it as the best pork that ever
was. In fact, I'd rather have it, because pork, you
know, is apt not to lay good on your stomach, but bear
meat never troubles you that way, no matter how much
you eat."

"I wish they'd let us shoot a few of these bears," said
the keeper. "But the government is very strict about
prohibiting the use of firearms by anyone except the
soldiers. It's strict in a good many other ways, too.
People are not allowed to soap the geysers or to carry
away souvenirs the way they used to."

226 Highways and Bjrways of the Rocky Mountains

"There's one family I know," said Mrs. Keeper,
"that has a piece of lime deposit they took from up by
the lake in the early days, and it's as big as a stove."

" But they couldn't have carried away such a piece,"
objected the keeper. "They couldn't come in herewith
wagons. There were no more roads than a jack
rabbit has."

"Oh— get out!" retorted the lady. "What's the
matter with you .? All the old-timers went through here
with wagons, though maybe that piece wasn't quite as
large as I said."

"Anyhow," resumed the keeper, "it got so people
would lug off anything they could carry, and the gov-
ernment made 'em quit. Soaping the geysers was an-
other freak of the public. If soap was thrown in, it
seemed to stir 'em up and make 'em spout. The largest
geyser in the Park was ruined by a dose of soap which
a soldier gave it, and which resulted in its blowing to
pieces. Then there was a Chinaman who had a laundry
in a tent at the Upper Basin. He emptied his soapsuds
where they ran into a geyser, and the geyser exploded
after a while and blew up the fellow's tent."

The longest walk I made while in the Park was from
Norris to the Canyon. Including the various asides, I
covered that day twenty-six miles. The jaunt, when I
set out, promised to be exceptionally fatiguing; for the
snow lay deep, and at every step I broke through a
crust that had formed during the night. But I soon got

May in the Yellowstone 227

into a path made by two bears which had followed the
road, one behind the other, almost the entire distance
to the Canyon. The imprint of their broad feet was
clearly marked and had a savagely human aspect. I
decided to give the creatures the road if I chanced to
meet them, and that I would climb a tree if they were
inclined to cultivate my acquaintance. But probably
they would have made as hasty a detour as any I con-
templated. At least, two grizzlies which I attempted to
approach one evening in the neighborhood of the hotel
where I was stopping, promptly scampered off into the
brush with just such snorts of alarm as a hog makes
when suddenly frightened into flight.

The road that the bears and I followed was, for much
of the distance, an avenue through the sober pine forest.
I was in a howling wilderness, if ever there was one,
but the nearest approach to howling that I heard was
the sonorous honking of wild geese. From the marshes
came the stuttering notes of a multitude of frogs. Sev-
eral times I heard partridges heralding the spring with
the resonant roll of their drums, and once in a while I
would see a chipmunk scudding timidly across the
snow, or a squirrel would chatter at me and accuse me
of being an undesirable citizen of the forest.

The winter keeper at the Canyon Hotel welcomed me
cordially, for it had been a long time since he had seen
anyone from the outside world. He was a young man,
but decidedly bald, which he took pains to explain was

228 Highways and Byways ot the Rocky Mountains

because he found it convenient one summer to wash
his head daily in a hot spring. "And that sulphur water
takes your hair out all right," said he — " kills it dead as
a doornail."

We went together to view the Canyon. This is un-
doubtedly the finest scenic attraction of the Park. It
is a narrow glen worn more than a thousand feet deep
in the many-tinted rocks, and graced with a noble
waterfall. The long leap of the stream, and the beauti-
ful color and imposing depth of the chasm, combine to
make the waterfall one of the most notable of which
America can boast. My guide as he looked down from
the verge of a crag on the warm-toned rocks of the tre-
mendous ravine said: "There's all kinds of gold in
that Canyon."

Surely the color might lead one to infer as much; but
why dream here of wealth, except that conferred by the
golden inspiration of the scene .? It was quite warm
there in the glen, and the snow was gone except for
remnants of drifts. "This is the tail-end of our winter,"
said the keeper; "but we are never sure of steady hot
weather. There's liable to be a cold snap and snow-
squalls at almost any time. That's a thing the tourists
from lower, warmer sections of the country are apt not
to think of, and lots of 'em come here with nothin' on
and really suffer."

It is possible to make the tour of the Park in several
different ways. To walk is ideal for a few, to take the

The falls in the canyon

May in the Yellowstone 229

regular lines of coaches is best for the majority, and an
occasional party will prefer to go with its own team and
tenting outfit. While I was on the train, after leaving
the Yellowstone, a Wyoming man who had made a
rustic trip to the Park in 1895 gave me an account of
his experiences. "There were two of us," said he —
" an old Texas soldier and me. He furnished the wagon
and horses, and I furnished the grub. We went right
through the mountains to the Park from the eastern
part of the state, and we got to her about the middle of
summer. I made a mistake in my pardner. He was an
old crank who didn't care for no natural scenery. The
only thing he wanted to do was to kill antelope. So he
was shooting 'em all the way — that is, he shot at 'em —
he didn't get 'em. But when we reached the Park the
guards took his gun away. There was nothing he was
interested in after that, and he didn't want to stop any-
where. I was bound to make the tour, though, and he
spent most of the time lying around camp. I'd liked to
have had an educated man with me who had some sense
and would have reasoned with me about what we saw.

" Well, we went all around. Those hot springs are a
wonder, ain't they .? and oh my ! ain't the falls at the
Canyon grand .? While I was at the Norris Basin some
of the tourists came in their fine coaches; and the ground
there, where the hot water holes and geysers are, looked
so shaky they wouldn't venture out on it. But I did,
and I says to 'em: 'This may be more risky than I

23° Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

think, and if I break through into the infernal regions
underneath I wish you'd write and tell my wife what
has become of me.'

"The paint pots are kind of dangerous to fool around,
too. And how did that mud geyser suit you ? It has the
darndest smell of any hole in the Park. I seen Old
Faithful spout, and lots of others. In particular I
remember the Giantess. She's a dandy fine one! Say!
but what splendid fishing there is in the Park! Near
the outlet of the lake I found the best place to ketch trout
that ever was heard of. I could stand and pull a fish out
of one stream, and without moving a step or taking him
off my line flop him over into a hot stream and scald him
ready to eat — ^yes, you bet your life! There's no ques-
tion about some of that Park water being hot. I often
wrapped eggs in a cloth and putt 'em in a stream or pool
to boil. The only fault I found with the trip was the
kind of man I had with me. When we got ready to
leave I told him he could drive his team home, and I
went along by train."

No doubt a sympathetic companion is a matter of
great importance in contributing to one's enjoyment of
the Park. Yet even an unsatisfactory comrade cannot
wholly dull its charm, as was proved in the case of the
man I have been quoting. At the time I met him he
was returning home after a long absence to attend the
funeral of his wife. In spite of his loss, though this was
sufficiently saddening when he happened to think of it.

May in the Yellowstone 231

he was full of jovial enthusiasm as he recalled those
wonderful days in the Yellowstone Park. They had
left delightful memories which would stay with him
the rest of his life, and his experience in this respect is
the usual one of visitors to that wonderland.

Note. — The railways afford an entrance to the Park from the north
at Gardiner, and from the west at Yellowstone. Usually the tour of
the Park itself is made by stage. In a general way, the route consists
of a circle in the center of the area, and it covers only a small portion
of the sixty-two miles length and fifty-four miles width of the entire
Park. But this is the "heart of wonderland," and what lies beyond
is largely variations of the same themes as are to be found along the
main thoroughfare. It takes at least six days to go over the route
comfortably, and more time can be spent to advantage. But better a
hasty trip of two or three days than to miss the Park altogether. Visit
at least the Mammoth Hot Springs, one of the geyser basins and 'the
Grand Canyon; and in doing this you will see much that is delightful
along the way.

The Park is especially attractive as a summer resort because the
days are never oppressively warm, and the nights are always cool.
Its fine roads afford the best of opportunities for horseback rides, there
is splendid trout-fishing, and you can indulge in mountain-climbing
and camping to your heart's content. You will, of course, be interested
in the remnants of volcanic action dying out in geysecs, pots of boiling
mud, and earth-rents hoarsely discharging their sulphurous steam.
But of all the Park's attractions I would rank highest the chance to
see the wild creatures of the forest. Here they are protected from the
attacks of the hunters; and even the buffalo — that nearly extinct
monarch of the plains — draws about him in security the pitiful rem-
nant of his once mighty herd. Two companies of United States cav-
alry are stationed in the Park to prevent the spreading of forest fires
and the commission of acts of vandalism.

One should be prepared for sudden changes of weather and altitude.
It is well to have wraps at hand such as shawls and light overcoats.

232 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

Thick-soled shoes for walking are desirable, and indeed are almost a necessity
at the Mammoth Hot Springs and among the geysers where numerous tiny
streams of hot water are sure to be encountered. Colored spectacles and a
pair of opera glasses will often add greatly to the pleasure of a trip.

The geysers number about one hundred, and the hot springs over four
thousand. Nowhere else in the world is there a group of geysers that can
rival these in number or in size. Some of the geysers lie dormant for years,
and then, without warning, break forth with renewed force. Hunters,
trappers, and fur-traders brought back tales of the wonders of the Yellow-
stone as early as 1830, but the first authentic account was that of a govern-
ment exploration party in 1871.

A little north of the park, near Gardiner, can be seen from the railroad or
the highway, Cinnaber Mountain with the curious Devil's Slide, consisting
of two ridges of hard sandstone, thirty feet apart, ascending the mountain
for two thousand feet.

Automobiles can reach the borders of the park from several directions, but
they are not allowed inside.

XIII

Custer's last battlefield

FEW events in the great Northwest have been more
tragic and melancholy than the encounter be-
tween the gallant Custer and the Indians late in
June, 1876. Not one of the whites escaped to tell the
story, and all we have learned of the details, except
what the battlefield itself discloses, has come from the
hostile red men. The struggle took place in southern
Montana, not far from what is now the village of
the Crow Agency. Through the lowlands flows the
winding, tree-fringed Little Bighorn River, and on the
broad alluvial lowlands are many small farmhouses
and fertile grain-fields belonging to the Indians.

Between the Agency and the battlefield, a distance of
three miles, is a level stretch of pasturage where a few
horses are usually to be seen grazing. Then you come
to hills rising in a long and often steep sweep to a high
ridge that overlooks all the country for miles around.
Along this ridge the battle was fought. It is a dreary
spot, entirely devoid of trees or other marked features.
The soil is full of small stones scantily hidden by growths
of sagebrush, prickly pear, and tufts of coarse grass.

234 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

The other ridges of the region have the same character,
but on the western horizon lies a low range of blue
mountains, and the strip of valley bordering the stream
is vernal and inviting.

For a mile along the hillcrest is a scattering of white
gravestones, each marking the spot where a soldier's
body was found. Some of these occur in groups, others
singly, and they are a pathetic indication of the fierce
struggle of the troops to defend and disentangle them-
selves from the clutch of their savage enemies. Occa-
sional stones are far down among the steep-sided coulees
that furrow the rough slope, as if the men had made
sorties in an endeavor to reach the river. No water
was to be had nearer, and the lack of it was a serious
handicap.

The last stand was made just under the western brow
of the extreme north end of the ridge, where it rises
highest — a cool and windy spot usually, but on a still
summer day baking hot. Opposite this height, on the
other shore of the river, the Indians had their encamp-
ments straggling along for two miles or more. Each
party was in plain viewof the other, and at all times knew
its opponent's movements and condition. Custer fell
in the midst of his men, and a wooden cross marks the
location where his body was found. I did not think
this rude memorial was altogether appropriate, but
nothing is safe from the rapacity of the relic-hunters,

The spot where Custer fell

Custer's Last Battlefield 235

and when they have destroyed one cross by carrying
it off splinter by splinter another can be set up in its
place at small expense.

The general opinion of the people in the Western
country seemed to be that Custer made a foolhardy
sacrifice of himself and his men. One informant, whose
views are typical of those I usually heard, expressed
himself thus :

"Custer was what you might call a dude — more
showy than practical; but for dashing bull-headed
bravery he couldn't be beat. If there was fighting he
didn't go behind, the way some oflS,cers do. He'd take
the lead; and he didn't have no more use for an Indian
than for a rattlesnake. As soon as he saw one his blood
began to boil and he was bound to kill him. The In-
dians had some advantages, though, over him and his
men. If the soldiers were to cut loose from their feed
wagons they'd perish. Civilized food was a necessity,
while the Indians were perfectly free to go where they
pleased and would live on anything they could get hold
of. They just liked to be chased by soldiers. What did
Indians care for them, or for the kids from the hospital
— West Point — who officered them .? A hundred cow-
punchers were worth a whole regiment of soldiers, and
I'd rather have had 'em — ^yes, or miners. Cow-punch-
ers and miners were a class that would fight any blame
man in those days. When they went into a fight they
meant business, and the Sioux had a great fear of 'em.

236 Highways and Bjrways of the Rocky Mountains

"One thing that perhaps had a good deal to do with
this particular battle was that Custer had been over-
stepping the mark in various ways so that he was out of
favor with some of the higher officers and the authorities
in Washington. He wanted to regain a little lost pres-
tige by winning a spectacular victory. Orders had been
given to fall back, if he discovered the enemy, and wait
for reinforcements. But he didn't do that. He didn't
even reconnoiter to find out what he needed to do.
There was no attempt at stratagem, and it is stratagem
that counts in war. He was too hasty, and charged
right into the Indians as soon as he came in sight of 'em.
It was his intention to massacree 'em, but instead of
that he massacreed his own men."

The records hardly bear out the fairness of these im-
pressions. Custer's orders were not of a hard and fast
sort, and they left nearly everything to his discretion.
His fatal mistake was in underestimating the strength
of the enemy; but this error was one he shared in com-
mon with all the other commanders in the expedition.
The war originated in the demand that certain wild
bands of the Sioux should settle down on the reserva-
tions under the control of the Indian Agent. It was not
supposed that these wanderers could muster more than
seven hundred warriors, and yet Custer encountered
about four times that number, including boys who were
armed with bows and arrows.

Custer's Last Battlefield 237

The campaign opened in March when General
Crook's command was so severely handled that he felt
obliged to retreat. This gave the Indians confidence,
and great numbers slipped away from the agencies to
join the hostiles. With the beginning of summer the
troops were again in motion, and Custer, whose com-
mand consisted of six hundred men, presently got on
the trail of the enemy. It was his business to punish
and bring them to terms, and he knew very well that the
Indians have no fondness for pitched battles. Even
with the odds in their favor they prefer to scatter and
run away. The only chance for the troops to effectively
chastise -them was to catch them unawares and strike
quick and hard.

On the morning of the battle the approach of the
soldiers was betrayed by the cloud of dust they raised,
for the weather was very dry; and as soon as Custer
knew that he was discovered he had his men move for-
ward with haste. They were then on the banks of the
Little Bighorn, and a portion of the command, under
Major Reno, crossed to the north side to go on up the
valley and engage the Indians, while Custer with the
rest, numbering about two hundred and fifty, kept to
the south side to fall on the enemy from a different direc-
tion. It was then nearly noon. Reno had not gone far
when he was brought to a halt by the foe, who assailed
him with such energy that in a good deal of confusion

238 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

he retreated and soon found himself besieged on one
of the hilkops.

With the first knowledge that the Indians had of the
approach of the troops they began preparations to break
camp and fly; but when Reno was driven back they
took courage and decided to delay their flight until the
urgency became greater. The entire fighting force then
concentrated their attention on Custer, leaving Reno
for the time being almost unmolested. Possibly, had he
gone to his superior's aid, the fate of the day might have
been changed, but he seems to have been too shaken by
what had already occurred to make the attempt.

Custer had moved along the ridges south of the stream
for several miles before the Indians attacked him, and
he was not backward about striking in return. His
opponents, in order to hide their own movements and
drive out the troops, set fire to the grass. This helped
develop a confusion that soon put the whites on the
defensive. They were in two or three different detach-
ments, and the enemy seems to have dealt with these
separately. The Indians would advance under cover
of the slopes far enough so that when they stood erect
they could see the troops, but were protected when
squatting or lying down. By rising and firing quickly
they exposed themselves only an instant; but this served
to draw the fire of the soldiers and make them waste
their ammunition. After a time they would give a war-

-a

Custer's Last Battlefield 239

whoop and charge. The fight was not long drawn out.
Its duration was only a few hours at most, and it came
to an end with the death of Custer who, fighting to the
last moment, had survived all his comrades.

The Indians, jubilant with victory, yelled and revelled
on the battlefield, scalping and plundering the dead
soldiers; and the young men and boys rode about firing
into the bodies. When darkness came they lighted
bonfires in their encampments, and though naturally
economical of fuel, they did not stint it this time, and
the surrounding hills were brightly illumined. All night
long they were engaged in frantic rejoicing, beating
drums, dancing, yelling, and discharging firearms.
The next day they attempted again to overwhelm Reno,
but he had rudely fortified himself and gotten a supply
of water, and he successfully resisted the fierce attacks.
Then, fearing the approach of another detachment of
troops, the entire body of Indians withdrew into the
wilderness.

The Crow Indians who dwell in the vicinity did not
join forces with thejiostiles. In fact, some of them were
scouting for Custer. At the Crow Agency village the
inhabitants are mostly whites who are government and
railroad employees, but the red men are always much
in evidence, coming and going. I found it rather a
charming hamlet, and even suggestive in a mild way of
an historic university town; for a number of good-sized

240 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

school buildings fronted on a grassy common of ample
area, and avenues of great trees arched the walks and
streets and grew in clumps about the buildings. So
there was pleasant shade, and a dreamy atmosphere of
serenity and refinement.

Among the other structures was a two-story wooden
hotel, very like any country hostelry, except that the
office had its walls papered with pictures, most of them
colored, and having as a rule Indian scenes for their
subjects. Especially conspicuous in this art collection
were two oil paintings done on tin that had served
formerly as receptacles for kerosene. They were about
three feet square, and had ponderous, gaudy frames.
One painting was of an Indian chief labelled, " Little
Dog," and the other of " Bronco Jim," a wild, bewhisk-
ered plainsman with his teeth showing, and a knife
raised ominously in his right hand. The two pictures
were really fascinating in their crude, raw ghastliness;
and it seemed perfectly evident that some aspiring sav-
age had painted them. But the landlord said: "No,
they were done by an old priest. After he was over
eighty and about ready to die he concluded he'd missed
his calling and started in to be an artist. So he got some
house paint in different colors, and flattened out some
old tin cans to serve instead of canvas and went at it.
You may think these are pictures of real people, but
they're ideals, names and all."

Custer's Last Battlefield 241

The Indian children are gathered in at the school
when they are seven years of age, and there they live.
It is usual to keep the girls till they are eighteen, unless
they leave to marry, and the boys stay till they are
twenty-one. The education is largely industrial, and
an attempt is made to give the students civilized habits
of home life both indoors and out. For the girls there
is cooking, washing, sewing, sweeping, etc., and for the
boys work in the barns and gardens and fields. The
boys have a keen liking for athletics, and their baseball
club nearly always wins in the match games with the
whites.

Outside of the village the long sweep of fertile, irri-
gated valley looks quite attractive, and the many herds
of horses and cattle on the hills seem to attest the pros-
perity of the Indian owners. But if you question the
white men who live in the neighborhood concerning
this apparent thrift they say: "Only about one out of
every fifty raises a crop or works, and even these few,
as soon as the results of their labor come to them in the
shape of money, usually blow it in. No matter how
large the sum is it only lasts them as long as it takes to
spend it, and they spend it dog-goned quick. They're
great hands to buy buggies to drive around in. One
feller went and bought three after selling a lot of hay
he'd raised. He had no more use for three buggies than
a man has for six legs. Two of 'em he gave away, and

242 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

in a few weeks he was wanting to sell the other for forty
dollars though it had cost him over a hundred.

" Of course there are exceptions to the rule. Some
are buying good teams and farming implements and a
bunch of cattle and getting down to business. They all
take pride in their horses, and they have some blame
good ones, and as nice rigs as any owned in Wall Street.
But in most ways they are lazy and have no judgment,
and their financiering is shortsighted and childish.
Very few of 'em are downright honest and square.
Instead, they're quite irresponsible and never pay a debt
if they can avoid it. You let them have goods on credit
and they'll go to the limit in buying every time, and then
want more rope.

" Perhaps the chief trouble is that they've been raised
to another style of living. You really couldn't expect
'em to be models of industry. They used to be a war-
ring, buffalo-hunting tribe. There were millions of
buffaloes in this region, and it was hunt and pleasure
for the Indians all the way through. But the govern-
ment got into a row with the Sioux, who became so bad
it was necessary to starve 'em into submission by clear-
ing out the buffaloes. Then the Crows saw hard times,
and the government made paupers of 'em by issuing
rations to the whole tribe, old and young. All an In-
dian had to do was to sit down and say he was hungry
to have his food passed out to him.

A waterside footpath

Custer's Last Battlefield 243

"The present agent has been trying to set 'em on
their feet and show 'em how to take care of themselves.
It was his idea that a man didn't deserve food if he
wouldn't work, and he cut off the rations from the able-
bodied intending to let 'em rustle. But rations were
still given to the old people, and the young bucks flocked
around to help eat them. So the issuing of food was
stopped entirely.

"The government controls considerable money that
belongs to the Indians, and they're all the time at the
agent to get hold of it. A person requesting money who
has a foolish plan for spending it is given some good
advice, and goes away empty-handed. An Indian is
not very demonstrative. If the advice suits him he looks
very solemn and shakes hands. If he's mad he looks
very solemn and walks off without any hand-shaking.
Some of the young fellows raise a great row when the
agent withholds their money, and to keep the peace he
turns it over to them, lets 'em fool it away and suffer
the consequences. To allow the old people to squander
their property that way is a more serious matter. As
long as they have a little income their relatives will take
care of 'em; but with their capital in their own hands
they're soon paupers. Then none of the tribe wants
them around and they lead a hard life.

" Most of the men have adopted the garments of the
whites, but the old fellows still cling to their blankets.

244 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

The women dress practically as they always have, ex-
cept that they use calico instead of buckskin, and sub-
stitute a white sheet in summer for the blanket they
ordinarily wear. The finest feminine garment is a dress
ornamented with elk teeth, or shells. Such a dress is
handed down as a family heirloom and is only worn by
recent brides and young girls. It is often worth a good
team.

"Some of the Indians have pretty nice places, but
the habits of the inmates of even the better homes are
apt to have a flavor of the barbaric. The girls will go
right home from the school and fry dough and boil meat
just as their mothers have in the past. You seldom
find anything but ordinary squaw-cooking. Then, too,
they get tired of living in a house. Perhaps it becomes
too dirty, and the family prefers to move out rather than
to clean it. So they transfer themselves to a tent. That
has advantages over a house, for when the dirt gets too
offensive they can shift the tent to a new spot. It's too
bad, but the tents are knocking out the old picturesque
tepees, because they are so much cheaper, and are
easier handled.

"The health of the Indians is poor. Tuberculosis
is the disease that is carrying off most of them. They
are very susceptible to it. For one thing, they don't use
any judgment about ventilation. A tepee would ven-
tilate itself Every time the flap at the entrance was

Custer's Last Battlefield 245

thrown up there'd be a change of air. It's different
with a house, or even with a modern tent; for they have
a campstove in the tent and sit around it and sweat, but
keep the fire going just the same. They don't like to go
to a doctor when they're sick. The mummery of their
own medicine men suits them better. We tried recently
to send a physician to a fellow who'd broken his arm,
but he hid out, and that arm will be crooked for the
rest of his days.

" They're very fond of dogs. A few weeks ago they
had a camp down the river a mile or two, and there were
seventy tepees and a thousand dogs. Some tribes like
dog meat to eat, but not these fellows, and the dogs
multiply past endurance. We had a poisoning bee here
one time. The Indians were goin' to get together for a
dance, and of course the dogs would all come; so we
decided to see what poison would do. We got a quarter
of beef the day before the dance, cut it up, fixed it well
with strychnine, and then took it in a rig and drove over
the road throwing the pieces out to the sides as we went
along. The next day there were dead dogs scattered
the entire distance. They were worthless curs, you
know, and if we didn't do something like that the whole
darn country would be overrun with 'em. The owners
never kill any, and if a dog goes mad it bites other dogs
and ponies and stock, and we have a dickins of a time."

A dance such as my informant referred to occurs
every two or three months, and the Indians gather it to

246 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

from twenty miles up and down the valley and continue
their pow-wow for several days. One of these was in
progress, about six miles north of the town, at the time
of my visit. The crops were all started, there was no
pressure of work, and it was a favorable time to get
together a crowd. Usually a man not only came him-
self but brought all his family, riding in a stout farm
wagon that was laden with food and bedding and a tent
or tepee. As if by magic a village sprang into being in
a glen that opened back into the hills from the main
valley. It was a crowded hamlet of white canvas with
many vehicles standing about, and a throng of Indians
enlivening the vicinity. On the afternoon that I joined
the gathering occasional members of the tribe lay dozing
in convenient patches of shade, others squatted in
groups to chat, still others sat looking down on the scene
from points of vantage on the steep hillslopes, and some
were going to a near stream for water or to let their
horses drink. There was much cantering to and fro
on the valley road and through the village and over the
surrounding hills. Often the riders were little girls and
little boys; yet they would gallop about perfectly fear-
less with as wild an ardor as any of their elders. I
marvelled that they were able to stay on, but as a local
dweller explained: "They start in to ride almost before
they can walk. The men tie 'em on and then turn 'em
loose."

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/^ dancer and a youthful admirer

Custer's Last Battlefield 247

In the midst of the encampment on a grassy level
was one tent far larger than any of the others. This
was reserved for the dancing, and now and then a brave
daubed with paint and arrayed with much savage finery
of beads and feathers stood forth near it and shouted a
weird high-voiced summons to the merry-making. The
painted warriors became increasingly numerous, and in
the case of some of them the paint and decorations were
about all they wore. Presently the dance began, but
many of the tribe continued to loiter about the camp or
to canter hither and thither on their ponies. As to the
spectators, they could go inside of the big tent or peer
through the crevices as they preferred. I found the
performance quite fascinating, and the music, though a
kind of monotonous chant accompanied by the pound-
ing of drums, was wildly exhilarating. Those concerned
entered into the activities with vigor and heartfelt en-
joyment, and their delight was contagious. The danc-
ing consisted either of marching, or of standing in
formal groups and keeping up an odd jerking motion
by bending the knees slightly and then straightening up.
Both men and squaws took part in the dancing, and
they were reinforced by some of the smaller children
who sang and jigged and paraded with all the fervor
of their elders. Once a band of men marched out of
the tent and went a few rods up the slope, where they
stood and bobbed up and down with nodding feathers
and chanted vociferously. They made an imposingly

248 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

picturesque group, and yet the individual warriors were
often simply frightful in their unearthly grotesqueness.
The Indians' enjoyment of the occasion was evident, and
I was not surprised to learn that they take better care
of their war bonnets and other ornaments displayed at
the dances than of anything else they own !

Three or four white people were present to witness
the ceremonies, and among them was an old farmer
from the next town up the valley. He left at the same
time I did, and we stopped for a chat on the outskirts
of the camp. After some preliminaries he became
reminiscent and said: "I was raised up a little bit like
old Abe Lincoln was. My folks was poor white trash
in the Tennessee Mountains. A fellow didn't have
much chance in that region. I cut twelve cords of wood
at twenty-five cents a cord to pay for my first pair of
cowhide boots, and I've swung a scythe many a time
for fifty cents a day. After the war I went to Kansas
poorer'n Job's turkey — hadn't a thing on earth — and
picked up odd jobs where I could. I've grubbed all
day there for a bushel of potatoes. I had to do that or
starve. But pretty soon I got hold of a nice farm, and
that country just suited me except for the fever and
ague. Finally, I concluded I couldn't stand it in the
Kansas river bottoms and I come to Wyoming and
bought up an old sagebrush desert. Any man that got
Into the Wild West twenty-five or thirty years ago had
to do some hard scratchin' to make a living; but we

Custer's Last Battlefield 249

prospered, and pretty soon I had a nice ranch. My
daughter too got to have a place of her own by filing
a homestead claim. She's a worker — good to tend a
garden and to do lots of other things around the farm.
Lately we sold out and come and drawed some of the
new land they're opening up in this valley. If only the
irrigation ditch had been finished in time I could have
growed forty bushel of spring wheat to the acre on my
land this year like a top. I don't like the cold northwest
winds they have in this part of the world, and I'm not
satisfied with the kind of home we've got. I'll tell you
for why^ — the region is open and bleak and a house looks
lonesome without trees. But I've putt in some cotton-
woods to break the wind, and in ten years' time we'll
have as snug a place as anybody could want. Yes, the
part of this valley where the whites are is going to be
fine. I don't know about the Indians. Whether they
can settle down to drudging on a farm and make a
success of it is a question."

Note. — ^To visit the scene of any famous event that the world has
recognized as exceptionally important or tragic is always a satisfac-
tion, and the Custer battlefield for this reason should draw to it many
a traveller from a distance. It is easily accessible, and though having
in itself no scenic beauty, its very dreariness adds to the sombre attrac-
tion of the spot. As an offset to the barren aspect of the battlefield,
there is near by the charming Crow Agency village, and the region
abounds with Indians making a struggle to adopt the ways of civiliza-
tion, yet not at present succeeding well enough to entirely lose their
picturesque interest. Of course, if the visitor can happen to be on
hand at the time of one of their frequent dances he has the chance to
see the savage in all his glory; and the spectacle has a wild impressive-
ness quite unforgetable.

XIV

AMONG THE BLACK HILLS

THE Black Hills are an outlying group of the
Rockies, so far removed from the main series of
ridges as to be almost unrelated. Roundabout
them for hundreds of miles the country is a monotony
of low hills and plains which offers a striking contrast
to this medley of craggy uplifts and irregular valleys.
Harney Peak, the monarch of the Black Hills group
reaches an elevation of over seven thousand feet, but
the immediate vicinity is itself so high that neither
Harney nor any of the other mountains are especially
impressive. On the slopes and heights grow dark
forests of pine, and in the vales is pasturage and many
a sunny well-watered glade where are occasional small
cultivated fields and rude farmhouses.

One advantage the Black Hills inhabitants claim to
have over the dwellers on the plains is that their region
is immune from tornadoes. "Since I've been here,"
said one old resident, "we've never had enough of a gale
to take the shingles off a woodshed."

But I was informed that in some of the outlying foot-
hill hamlets the wind at times blew so that the people
"could hardly keep the buttons on their clothes."

Panning for gold

Among the Black Hills 251

Considerable mellow soil has gathered in the valley
pockets, yet rocks are for the most part omnipresent,
often thrusting up great ragged ridges to a height of
hundreds of feet. Mica is plentiful in the rocks, and
the soil is full of glittering particles that have a very
pretty sheen and sparkle in the sunshine. Then, too,
you see many scattered fragments of quartz as clear as
crystal, and though the quartz and the pulverized mica
have no value they attract and please the eye, and are
suggestive of hidden wealth.

The discovery of gold in the Black Hills is usually
attributed to a government exploring expedition which
spent the summer of 1874 in the region; but even at
that time there were a good many miners roaming
around prospecting, entirely independent of the troops.
The miners found gold, and so did the soldiers, and
both told stories of wealth to be found in the Hills that
created great interest throughout the country and at
once gave the group of wild mountains world-wide
fame.

For a number of years the floating population of the
frontier had been suffering from a dearth of exciting
mineral discoveries, and they promptly made ready to
rush in. Numerous other fortune-seekers were attracted
from the older Eastern states. The fact that they would
be trespassers on the choicest hunting-ground belong-
ing to the Sioux Indians was no serious deterrent. Men
have always been ready to risk their lives for gold; and

252 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

the rights of Indians do not usually count for much with
the whites. The government, however, had included
the Black Hills in the Sioux reservation, and, to avoid
trouble, the authorities at Washington endeavored to
keep the miners out. They soon realized the hopeless-
ness of the attempt, if the Hills were rich in gold, and
started negotiations to buy the tract from its owners.
This they succeeded in doing in 1876, but fortune-
seekers were numerous in the Hills long before the trans-
fer was made.

"People went crazy about gold," one old-timer said
to me; "and though the soldiers took a good many
men out of the reservation the population was increas-
ing right along. Men who were used to mining and to
rough frontier life couldn't have been driven away with
a club. They were bound to keep on gold-hunting in
spite of everything. I know an old man who's a fair
sample of what those fellows were then. All the soldiers
in the United States couldn't keep him away from a
mining camp. In his day he made quite a lot of money;
but it has all slipped away from him. Still he sticks to
mining, and he's out in the mountains prospecting now.
He hunts around and picks up stones that look promis-
ing, pounds 'em up in a mortar and pans out the stuff
to see if there's gold in it. He's all alone, and some day
he'll be found dead in his little shack.

"My pardner and me come here in the spring of '75.
The soldiers didn't ketch us, and we was in the town of

Among the Black Hills 253

Custer when the big strike of gold was made early the
next year in Deadwood. It was toward the end of
winter, and there was still snow on the ground, but
everybody who could leave started off for the new dig-
gings. We'd thought Custer was going to be the big
town of the Black Hills; and yet almost in a night it
was depopulated. There were fourteen hundred build-
ings in the place, and only fourteen persons remained
in town; so there were a hundred buildings to each
person.

"It's funny how people will hustle off that way.
They are just like a lot of cattle stampeded in a storm —
each going with the crowd in a mad rush and not seeing
or thinking. A feller will tell about a prospect that he
thinks is going to be a money-maker. The next man
who tells the story enlarges on it a little, and by the
time it's passed through half a dozen hands everybody
goes wild. Off they start for the new camp; but even
if no one makes a cent there's not a man among 'em
who isn't happy until he's broke.

"I didn't make any lucky gold strikes myself and
presently I tried work of another sort. In the spring of
'']'] I carted hay forty or fifty miles from the borders of
the Hills to Deadwood. I had eight oxen and carried
about two tons to a load. The hay cost me thirty dollars
a ton, and I sold it for fourteen cents a pound. Supplies
of all sorts were scarce here in those days, and the stock
in Deadwood really suffered for food. I wasn't long in

254 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

disposing of what I brought. I'd stop in the middle of
the street, and men would crowd around the load like
a swarm of bees, and hold up their money to buy. The
hay was tied up with light rope into bundles that sold for
a hundred pounds- but which didn't weigh much over
seventy-five. As soon as my cart was emptied I'd turn
around and come back to where there was prairie and
a chance for the oxen to graze. I couldn't have afforded
to feed them in Deadwood.

"I was out and around alone a good deal; and yet
with all the travelling I did I never saw any Indians.
I didn't want to see any. They weren't friendly toward
the whites, and I was always more or less anxious
about 'em. So were the other people who came into
the region. But I was more afraid of lawless white
men. They'd dress up in imitation of the savages —
paint themselves and put on blankets and fasten a
horsetail on the back of their heads to look like long
Indian hair. Then they'd rob the stage and the poor
tenderfoot who was coming in with money. Lots of
misdeeds were laid to the Indians where they weren't
to blame at all. What the outlaws liked best was to
hold up the coaches when they heard that bullion was
going to be shipped out; but now and then the owners
of the bullion would fool the robbers by filling the bags
with sand.

"The nearest I came to running afoul of Indians was
one morning on my way to Deadwood with a load of

Begging to go fishing

Among the Black Hills 255

hay. I came to a spot where a party of whites had
camped the night before, and found a woman dead
beside the road. It was a pretty bad place for Indians-
handy for game and water, and just the spot they'd
naturally pick out for a camp. They had turned
loose on the whites at about daylight, and of co'se the
whites skipped out. They didn't know what they was
doing — ^this outfit didn't. All but one woman escaped
up a hill. The horses was so scared they stampeded,
and the Indians couldn't get them; and there was no
chance to steal from the wagons because the whites were
all the time shooting. In a little while the Indians left.
Pretty soon afterward I happened along, and there lay
the dead woman, and the rest of the company was
hollering on the bluff.

"No one was safe from the Indians in the first year
or two. They would crawl up the high hills and shoot
at the men working in the gulches below, and the miners
used to keep their guns handy, and they provided de-
fences for emergencies.

"The last Indian rising was in 1892. One of the old
heads went into a trance. He said the Messiah appeared
to him and ordered the Indians to drive out the whites,
and promised that the deer and buffalo would return
so the Indians would have their happy hunting-ground
to themselves again. They began to massacree the
whites; but the troops soon put a stop to that sort of
thing. The savages might have made more of a fight

256 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

if they hadn't been so afraid of cannon. Let 'em hear
the discharge of a cannon, and they think the world is
coming to an end. With just one cannon you can scare
a whole tribe. Often you don't even need to fire it; to
show it on a knoll is sufficient."

The man whose comments I have reported was a
citizen of Custer where I spent some time rambling
about the region. The town has never recovered from
the famous exodus that depopulated it in its youth, and
is merely a village in a glade of the rocky uplands. As
a matter of fact the only really notable mine in the
Black Hills is the "Homestake" near Deadwood. This
employs nearly two thousand men under ground and
is one of the richest gold mines in America. The first
prospectors looked around the neighborhood late in
1874, and other parties came drifting in the next year;
but there was no special excitement till a twelve-month
later. Deadwood Gulch, where gold was first found in
quantity, was then covered with a dense growth of pine,
much of it dead and mingled with a nearly impassable
tangle of underbrush.

The biggest strike was made by a man named Wheeler.
He is said to have cleaned up over one hundred thou-
sand dollars, and then to have asked and obtained an
escort of soldiers to see him safely across the wilderness
to the nearest railway station, two hundred miles dis-
tant. What became of him and his fortune afterward
no one could tell me. If he went away satisfied with

Among the Black Hills 257

the wealth he had accumulated he was a very excep-
tional miner. Usually the lucky ones embarked on new
ventures and lost their earlier gains. The chances were
always fascinating, but where one made money, thou-
sands of other adventurers made nothing at all. Per-
haps the commonest source of profit to those who dis-
covered "a prospect" was to sell it to moneyed Eastern
men. The purchasers, as a rule, not only put their
money in the ground but left it there.

During the spring and summer of 1876, each day,
and almost each hour, witnessed the arrival of new
parties of gold seekers in Deadwood Gulch. Whoever
could saw a board or drive a nail commanded his own
price, and in a short time the place grew from a few log
cabins to a city of seven thousand inhabitants. The
hotels were so crowded it was considered a luxury to
occupy a chair in the office during the night. Every-
thing was extremely expensive. Bread went as high as
a dollar a loaf, and people were glad to get it at that
price. One man with whom I talked declared that the
high cost of living was a result of modern trust methods
among the merchants.

"They were pretty smart," said he, "and were care-
ful not to let too many supplies come in at a time to
lower the price. If they had a load of flour on the way
they'd drive out with a buggy and meet it and have it
stop or come slower. They'd carry back just a few
sacks and say the team was delayed by bad roads.

258 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

" But no one minded those little tricks then. Every-
body come in with plenty of money, and they expected
to be able to get plenty more when that was gone. A
good many of the gold-seekers was fetched in by Joe
Vollin, who had a freighting outfit going back and
forth between the Black Hills and the Missouri. He
charged 'em twenty-five dollars a head, and they had to
walk all the way. But they were allowed to put their
little baggage — a couple of blankets and a satchel — on
the wagon. If the wagon got stuck in the mud, a rope
would be hitched to the end of the tongue, and the
tenderfeet would get hold and help pull the thing out on
firmer ground. You take seventy-five or a hundred
men and they can pull a dickins of a load. They worked
their way and paid their fare, too; but they thought
that was all right. They'd never been in a wild country
before, so it was easy for Vollin to scare 'em with his
Indian stories, and they had no hankering to go ahead
by themselves.

"Often they didn't know what to do when they got
here. They'd thought the gold would be lying around
right on the surface of the ground. It was their idea
they could walk along the cricks and pick up the gold
in lumps. When they found they'd have to work for it,
and that there was nothing to be seen but dirt and rocks
and wild woodland many a feller got sick of the proposi-
tion about the second day and was ready to pay Vollin

On a Black Hills roadway

Among the Black Hills 259

another twenty-five dollars to be allowed to walk back to
civilization alongside of one of the freighting wagons."
The placer mines of Deadwood Gulch and the tribu-
tary ravines were for a short time very remunerative,
and the town that grew up there was the metropolis of
the Black Hills. Thither the miners from all the region
around wended their way every Saturday night with
their weekly accumulation of gold dust and nuggets.
Gold in these forms was the commonest kind of currency
in the Hills, and everyone carried a bottle or sack of it
for use in place of money. On arriving in Deadwood at
the week-end the average miner proceeded to spend his
golden wealth like a nabob; and on Monday morning,
with a fresh supply of "grub" thrown over his shoulder
he returned to his claim to delve for more of the precious
metal. No doubt he was cheered at his rough labor by
the certainty of having another "good time" the next
Sunday. That was the busiest and noisiest day of the
week in Deadwood. The streets were crowded both
with buckskin-clothed mountaineers, and with recent
arrivals from the East. You heard the blows of ham-
mers and the rasping of saws where buildings were
being erected. Here a gambler was crying his game,
and there a street preacher was exhorting sinners to
repent.

As to preachers, one finds very little veneration for
them among the mining folk — at least in fair weather.
"We never was much for going to church," remarked

26o Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

a pioneer of the region. "You can't make no money
that way, and a miner has something else to do besides
attending to religion. It's curious, but it's a fact, that
when a preacher wanted to build a church or anything
of that sort he was sure to get most of the money off the
gamblers and liquor sellers. Naturally they can't collect
much from their religious church members, because a
man that prays all the time can't be expected to earn or
have much money. Such men perhaps give ten cents or
a quarter apiece, while from each saloon the minister
will get ten or twenty dollars. Then he'll give the liquor
sellers thunder in church the next Sunday. Religion
is only society — I call it. You take away the social
attraction, and you'd have nothing left. In fact, there
are not many people in the world who believe very
seriously in religion unless they're weak in the mind.
Still, it's good enough for young people and puts a kind
of fear in 'em they never forget. But you can't put much
fear into an old man like me. I'm glad though to have
my children attend church. It keeps 'em down a little.
They'll learn fast enough."

The only local clergyman who seems to have gained
a permanent place in the hearts of the mining folk is one
who was killed by the Indians while on his way to a
neighboring village where he was to preach. He knew
the danger, and yet duty called and he took the risk.
This heroism and the tragic result brought him what no
amount of exhortation would have gained, and he is one

Among the Black Hills 261

of the Black Hills saints. High on the terrace of a bluff
above the town is the cemetery overlooking the narrow
glen, and there the martyr preacher is honored with a
full-length brown-stone statue which has an inclosing
coop of chicken-wire fencing to protect it from the af-
fection of those who would like to chip off mementoes.
A still more popular hero, similarly memorialized,
was "Wild Bill." While on a visit to the region to see
what the country was like he was shot dead as he was
playing in one of the gambling places. So far as I could
learn he was of the ordinary type of frontiersman — not
a desperado as his name and manner of death might
suggest — but with the usual frontier virtues and fail-
ings. He had been a scout in the Civil War and had
served in a like capacity on the plains. There was no
fear in his make-up, but he well knew that he had en-
emies, and he took the precaution, whenever he sat
down indoors, to place himself with his back to the wall.
But this did not save him from a violent end.

A marble bust on a pedestal formerly marked his
grave in the cemetery, but the relic hunters did some
busting on their own account after the sculptor finished,
and soon the monument was ruined. Then fresh con-
tributions were levied, and now the visitor to the ceme-
tery sees a full-length brown-stone figure of a bare-
headed, long-haired plainsman, standing in a wire coop
like that which protects the martyr preacher. In one
hand the effigy holds a pistol and is about to draw

262 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

another from his cartridge belt. It is a rather belliger-
ent looking figure for that silent city of the dead, and its
grotesqueness has been made the more emphatic by
painting the pupils of the eyes blue.

Another contemporary notable was " Calamity Jane."
This name appears to have been her chief stock in trade,
and about the only reason for her being remembered.
She was shiftless and vicious — an idling dare-devil who
was in her glory when she dressed up partly in man's
clothes and partly in woman's and walked around the
the streets to be greeted as "Calamity Jane." No
monument marks her resting-place — possibly because
there was nothing startling about the manner of her
death.

In the turmoil of the first year or two of the gold
excitement Deadwood was a rough town. It was full
of gamblers, and shooting was a common pastime.
But this period soon passed, and the place became as
orderly and well-governed as most of its sort. That
does not mean it was ideal; for drinkers, gamblers, and
other purveyors or indulgers in dissipation are allowed
to do much more as they please in mining towns than
in the average community.

By reason of its situation the town is particularly
piquant and interesting, and it has a pleasing air of
stability and comfort. The homes cling along the
declivities of the deep gulch, and creep far up every side
ravine. Some of the streets with their attendant board

A walk with grandmother

Among the Black Hills 263

sidewalks are marvels of steepness; and the houses are
arranged in terraces, each row looking down on the
roofs of those below. In the depths of the hollow are
the railroads and a swift muddy creek, business blocks,
mines, shops and other buildings, all jumbled together
and entirely lacking elbow-room. Roundabout rise
the lofty wooded ridges with here and there a perpen-
dicular crag, or a hilltop crowned with monumental
ledges and heaps of boulders. It seems a fitting place
for Nature to have exercised her magic in making the
gold which has directly or indirectly been the means of
drawing most of the population to this rugged region.

Note. — The Black Hills cover a stretch of country about one hundred
miles in length by fifty in width. They rise abruptly from the surface of a
level prairie country and reach altitudes varying from three thousand to seven
thousand feet. It is evident that with their streams and crags and pine-
dad slopes they must contain not a little scenery that is ruggedly attractive.
There are many picturesque villages in the valleys, and a leisurely traveller
who likes rambling on foot or riding on horseback finds much to enjoy. The
town that is most strikingly interesting in its setting, and in its romantic
history, is Deadwood. Several other places that have considerable attrac-
tion, either commercial or scenic, are near at hand, and among these is the
city of Lead, where is located the great Homestake Mine.

A few miles farther north, at Spearfish, is a canyon which rivals those of
Colorado. Still farther north, not far from Minturn on the Belle Fouche
River, is the curious Devil's Tower or Bear Lodge. This is a natural obelisk
of columnar, basaltic rock, one thousand two hundred feet high, and taper-
ing from a diameter of eight hundred feet at the bottom to three hundred
and seventy-five feet at the top. It is supposed to be the neck or plug of
an extinct volcano.

The routes in the state are only natural roads most of the way, and in
unfavorable weather are decidedly hard travelling.

XV

A DAKOTA PARADISE

IT was known in local parlance as the " Jim " River
Valley, and its metropolis was called "Jimtown;"
but on the map you found the James River and
Jamestown. The fertility and productiveness of the re-
gion are superlative. Aside from this, however, neither
the river nor the valley can lay any great claim to beauty.
The Jim is a sluggish stream that wanders placidly
through the alluvial and often marshy lowlands and never
cuts up any wild pranks by flooding and tearing to pieces
the land along its borders. On one side or the other,
sometimes on both, mild, grassy bluffs rise to a higher
level where the country sweeps away in an apparently
limitless prairie, dotted with groups of farm buildings
and criss-crossed with roads and wire fences. Trees
are rare except for plantings around the homes, and
these plantings are still for the most part of slender
growth. At the coming of the first settlers the upland
was perfectly clear prairie, and even along the river
"not a stick" grew for scores of miles. But now nearly
every farmer has started a grove of cottonwoods and
other quick-growing trees to ameliorate the barrenness

A Dakota Paradise 265

of the home surroundings, break the wind, and furnish
a Httle firewood.

"This is a great country for winds," one man ex-
plained to me as I chatted with him in the dooryard
adjoining his home, in the southern part of the state.
"Why, I built a heavy hay rack on my wagon one morn-
ing, and before night that rack lay on the ground and
the wagon was on top of it. The same wind tipped a
passenger train off the track within three miles of here.
But it wa'n't no twister. It was right down straight-
away business. We don't have cyclones. Of course
the clouds come rolling up pretty threatening some-
times, and my wife will perhaps go down cellar, but I
don't think that is necessary.

"We've been having good seasons right along lately,
and everything is prosperous and the people happy.
But it was different in the early days. There was a
kind of a craze then over the Jim River Valley, and my
people come rushing in with a good many others from
Illinois about 1880. They went over plenty of country
just as good long before they got here. But they were
just like a herd of cattle that had broken into a corn-
field — sure not to stop till they'd got to the farther side
of it. The first year that we lived here the weather
was so dry we couldn't raise a thing. Hundreds of acres
of wheat never sprouted at all, and the ground con-
tinued as bare as my kitchen floor. You couldn't de-
pend on anything in those times; but now that the

266 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

country is broken up and more or less trees growing we
seem to have a different climate. The first settlers
thought they'd been terribly fooled. However, the
disappointment was partly their own fault. The men
who came in here then were mostly clerks from stores
and cashiers of banks and that sort of fellows. They
expected they could get rich off of wheat easy, and they
were goin' back East as soon as they'd made their for-
tunes. Wheat was the only thing they planted, and
when that failed there was nothing else for 'em to fall
back on. They didn't have hardly any cattle, and not
even hens. Butter and eggs were shipped into the
valley from a distance, and the settlers went to town
and bought 'em. That's no way to farm.

"A good many, after a bad season or two, saw what
sort of a boat they were in, and picked up their things
and left. But some couldn't get out. They were so
poor they had to stay. The walking was all right, but
they didn't feel like walking so far. A quarter section
as good as you'd want to squat on could be bought for
three hundred dollars. And yet, at that time I wouldn't
have taken a quarter section as a gift if I'd got to pay
the taxes on it.

" I own quite a herd of cattle, and I depend on them
to tide me over if we have a bad crop year. There's
thirty acres in my chunk of pasture. Buffalo grass is
the chief forage there. It is a curly grass that sprawls
over the ground and never grows very high; but the

Beside the stream

A Dakota Paradise 267

cattle like it, and even after it dries up the goodness
seems to be retained, and they will live on it all winter.
For hay we depend a good deal on the wild red top that
grows on the bottoms. I've seen it waist high and so
heavy that the rains would lodge it down. When fall
comes, if a man wants more hay for the winter than he
has secured already, he goes out and mows on the prairie.
The grass there is then perfectly dry, just as it stands,
and can be put in stacks as soon as it is cut."

"Isn't your land suited to alfalfa .?" I asked.

"Oh, yes," he replied, "we can raise alfalfa till the
cows come home; but at present there's very little
tame grass of any kind grown here. Wheat is still the
principal crop, and it doesn't seem to exhaust our soil
as it does in most regions. We are getting good wheat
yet from fields that have been sown to that same crop
for thirty years. But our farming is going to be more
diversified in the future. Dairying will be one of our
important industries, and we'll make all kinds of money
at it. Yes, the milk business is bound to be a cracker-
jack here. There's no inspection, and the price in town
is seven cents a quart in summer and eight in winter.
The time will come, too, when we will fertilize more.
Now we generally burn our straw stacks to get rid of
them; and the barnyard and stable refuse we dump
into some convenient hollow. We wouldn't trouble to
cart it off from around our buildings only it's in the way.
But I've noticed that where the old straw stacks have

268 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

stood the new grain grows twice as stout as elsewhere,
and adjoining the spots where the stable dumps are,
the weeds grow ten feet high. So it's plain we're wast-
ing valuable material for enriching the soil; and I've
begun to put every bit of fertilizer this farm makes on
the land. It's the common habit to cultivate all the land
in sight even if you only half take care of it. We do the
work any old way to get a crop, but I believe in fewer
acres and better tillage."

This farmer had a quarter section and took care of it
with very little help except what he got from his children,
and they were too young to do much. " I don't want to
make pack-horses of them," said he. " It's natural for
children to like play, and it ain't right to pin them down
too close. One of my neighbors works at carpentry,
and his little boys, ten and twelve years old, run the
farm. Light tasks in moderation are all right, but the
heavy work those boys have to do, and the responsi-
bility will be apt to hurt them in growth and health and
make 'em old before their time. There are cases,
though, where the boys have to pitch into the work
whether they're able to or not. My father was in that
fix with his family. He got in with a skinner who
skinned him out of all he had, and we were obliged to
begin at the bottom. But I don't want my boys to work
as hard as I did."

I stayed at this farmer's to dinner. The house was
small and flimsy, and they were planning to put up a

A Dakota Paradise 269

new dwelling soon, and it was to be nearer the road
where they could see people passing. There was no
cellar except a hole under the kitchen, to which access
was gained by a trap door, and the three rooms were
hopelessly overcrowded.

"Are you a foreignor .?" questioned the housewife
when we were seated at the table. "You have a kind
of brogue different from the people here in this country."

"I'm from Massachusetts," I responded.

"Why, yes," the woman commented, "now I think
of it, you talk just Uke a lady from Boston who was
visiting at our next neighbor's last summer."

They were a cordial and hearty family, and though
their surroundings were rather barren and primitive,
I thoroughly enjoyed their acquaintance. In a few
years more they would probably make many improve-
ments in the home premises and would attain a pros-
perity little, if any, short of wealth.

Most of the villages in the valley are mere patches on
the prairie, and you can look from the streets out on
the farmlands in any direction. But Jimtown is large
enough to spread over considerable territory, and its
business blocks and better residence streets are begin-
ning to have an air of substantial permanence. It is
still, however, sufficiently rustic for most of its dwellers
to own a cow or two. These are collected each morning
in several herds and driven away in different directions

270 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

to the outlying pasturage; and in the evening they are
brought back and separate to go to their individual
stables.

The people are proud of the place.' Indeed, it is a
very miserable sort of a town in the West that the in-
habitants are not proud of. As a rule they are ever
ready to sing the praises of the town they have adopted
and make a sort of fad of "boosting" it. "Yes," said
one of the Jimtowners, " this is a lively place. We don't
go to sleep in the daytime. It is the trading center for
all the wealthy farm region around, and you can judge
something of the value of the trade we get when I tell
you that lots of the farmers bring their butter and eggs
to town in thirty-five hundred dollar automobiles. The
younger farmers, especially, not only make money but
spend it like water. All the best shows stop here, and
the farmers make up a considerable part of the audience
at the opera house. To pay a dollar or a dollar and a
half for a seat is just peanuts to these fellows. The
older men go slower. They don't spend a great deal
for pleasure, but when they have surplus money buy
another quarter section. A great deal of land that they
got a few years ago for ten dollars an acre is worth
thirty now. When a man picks up coin like that with-
out raising his hand it's comin' in hacks, and he's apt
to get chesty and forget there ever was a time when he
was poor. Prosperity has made quite a change in our

3

-a

A Dakota Paradise 271

farmers. They don't work any more, unless you call
it work doing everything riding around on machines."

The remarks I have quoted were made by the pro-
prietor of a barber's shop into whose place of business
I wandered one evening. He was interrupted by an
exclamation from a bald-headed customer whose
bare cranium was being anointed with a hair restorer by
the barber's assistant. " You're careless with that stuff,"
said the customer. "Don't let it run down over my
forehead or I'll be like the dog-faced man in the circus.
Last week a drop of it fell on my shoe, and I'll be
dinged if that spot ain't all growed out thick with hair."

A young fellow sitting in a chair tilted back against
the wall reading a newspaper now looked up and re-
marked: "That's about as big a story as those BiH
Conroy tells. The other day he was saying that one
time he was helping build a bridge across a canyon,
high up above a river, and he was underneath hang-
ing by his toes driving spikes when his watch dropped
out of his pocket. He'd paid sixty dollars for it,
and it was too valuable to lose. So he let go with his
toes, and down he went so fast that he overtook the
watch and grabbed it just as it was going into the
water."

"Did you ever have any trouble with the Indians
here?" I inquired.

"No," responded the barber. "When the whites
come the Indians took to the tall timber. Our troubles
were of another sort."

272 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

"I first saw Jimtown in 1880," said the bald-headed
man. " It was then just a little frontier settlement with-
out a single building of brick. Homesteaders were
locating in the region all around, and they lived in cheap
shanties throwed together just as quick as they could
put 'em up."

"Well," interrupted the fellow with the newspaper,
"there's a good many men yet who have a punk house,
even though they've built a nice barn."

"What is a punk house?" I asked.

"Oh, one that's tumbledown and unpainted," he
replied. "Some men build a good barn and live in the
granary until they get the money to put up a house."

"Yes, there's makeshifts still," acknowleged the
bald man; "but nothing like what there used to be.
Often, the early houses were made of sod. To build
one a man would plough up the turf, turning a furrow
fourteen inches wide and four deep. Then with a spade
he'd cut the strips of turf into two-feet lengths and
build his house walls with the pieces just as if he was
laying bricks. Usually he'd first put up a hut of boards
and make his walls of sod right around against the sides
of it; but some got along with turf only. You couldn't
have a warmer house, and if well made it would last a
dozen years. But of course the roots that held the
sod together soon decayed, and if the roof leaked or
the wall got jammed the house would go to pieces in
a very short time.

A Dakota Paradise 273

" However, we'd been willing to worry along in any
sort of a house if the crops had been all right. What
troubled us was the weather. For several years there
was such a lack of rain everything dried up; or we'd
get hot winds with a little hail mixed in with 'em occa-
sionally that would spoil all our hopes. I've seen the
wheat looking prosperous and nice as could be, with
the heads forming, and in a week later it would be just
burnt up. If those hot winds came, goodby to your
crop. The air was like an oven. It would scorch you
almost. One year I had a hundred and twenty-five
acres of oats that averaged two bushels to the acre, and
three hundred acres of wheat that only panned out
fifty bushels in all, and a hundred and forty acres of
flax that yielded sixty bushels of dirt and flax, and
probably two-thirds of it was dirt. After three such
seasons in succession we was in bad shape; and the
town merchants was hit pretty hard, too. The farmers
couldn't buy, and they couldn't pay their old debts.
They simply had to be tided over by the merchants till
they could get the money out of the ground. If the
crops had been good we wouldn't have had our noses
rubbing oathe grindstone, but would have been looking
skyward. Some farmers didn't have a dollar to buy
seed, and they could only mortgage all they hadn't
mortgaged before and pinch along hoping the next year
would be better. Meanwhile they'd perhaps live
mainly on potatoes and turnips, with now and then a
quarter's worth of flour as a luxury."

274 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

"You can't tell me anything new about that," said
the barber. " My folks stayed here through bad season
after bad season until all our front teeth dropped out.
The drouth and the interest made a team you couldn't
buck at all. People had to borrow, and the money
sharks could get their own price. We paid three per
cent, a month on four thousand dollars. I told my
father he might just as well lay down and put his heels
up in the air; but he hated to give up that farm. The
soil was as black as your hat and not a pebble in it.

"There's a good deal of such land in this country,
but we have other sorts, too. Once in a while you find
gumbo, and if it's dry and you strike a regular patch of
it while you're ploughing, the plough will jump right
up in the air. If it's wet the sun soon drys what your
plough tips over into chunks that are as hard as paving
bricks. Then there's clay soil — Gee whiz! you walk
through that in the spring, and your shoes will gather
it up till they're three feet across. It's fierce, ain't it,
Seth .?" and the barber turned to the young man with
the newspaper.

" I wouldn't live on a farm if you'd give me one,"
Seth responded. "It's too lonesome. The neighbors
are a mile apart — yes, all of that. Besides, the winters
are too cold, and the roads get too drifted. After a
snowstorm, if the wind blows, you want to get under
cover. How it will stack the snow up! I've been on
top of drifts so high I could touch the telegraph lines."

Advising the boys

A Dakota Paradise 275

"Snowdrifts — why here's where we raise 'em," de-
clared the barber; "and it's one beauty of this country
that you don't have to buy coal but eleven months in
the year. The other month you sift ashes or sit around
with your overcoat on. I've seen the mercury take such
a drop that we had to hook three thermometers together,
one below the other, to get the record. Someone im-
ported a Klondike thermometer, but it froze to death.
It couldn't live here at all. Yes, at times it's so cold we
have to go outdoors backward. If you try to walk out
straight ahead your breath freezes in front of you in a
solid mass that brings you to a standstill. Thirty
degrees below zero is nothing here. We go around all
day and never mind it. The wind doesn't blow at such
times; it seems to be frozen up. Of course, during the
cold season, this ain't no summer resort nor anything
like that, but the freezing point in the damp atmos-
phere of Chicago is worse than zero in our dry air."

"It's one blessing of our summer that we always
have cool evenings," observed the bald man. "You
can take pretty near the hottest day, and you need a
blanket over you at night That's where we've got the
vmtld beat. A man can't get a really beneficial rest
reeking with sweat and with no air to breathe."

"How about mosquitoes ?" I asked.

"We have a good many in a wet season," said the
barber. " Some of 'em seem to be about the size of a
canary, and they come around and present their bill

276 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

most any time of day. They don't bother us much in
the town; but oh, golly! you find 'em good and thick
in any swamp you happen to strike."

"This is fine country for prairie chickens," remarked
Seth, "and hunters come from everywhere to shoot
them. On the first day of September, when the season
opens, every rig in town goes to the prairies, and the
teams have all been spoken for over a month before.
A nice fried prairie chicken is something worth talking
about. It's a far greater delicacy than any farmyard
fowl. The wild flavor just suits me. But the birds are
getting shyer and shyer, so you can't do much success-
ful shooting without a well-trained dog. Later in the
fall the wild ducks and geese come here to get the rice
that grows in the shallows of the ponds and lakes. They
go over the town in such big flocks that the air is some-
times fairly blue with them. In the evening the electric
lights seem to disconcert 'em, and you can see 'em
wheeling about up there in the sky and hear 'em honk-
ing and quacking."

While we were talking a shower came up, and the
bald man said, "Tomorrow's Saturday — I hope it
won't rain then because that's the farmers' day to come
to town and get supplies."

"And I hope it won't rain Sunday or Monday," said
Seth, "because those are the days for baseball."

"I suppose they don't play ball much on Sunday
back in the East," observed the barber; "but in our

A Dakota Paradise 277

towns here we have a Sunday game almost every week
from spring to fall; and I'd like to have you explain to
me what there is in a ball game to drive a man to hell.
Those people that prefer to rest, let 'em get up in the
attic and stay there; but if others want to chase a pewee
around, that's their business. A man who has to work
all the week likes a little recreation on Sunday; and if
it suits him to take in a ball game or go shooting gophers
he ought to have his say about it, instead of being told
by the preacher when to head in. The folks that prefer
to go to church — let 'em; but there's just enough mule
about all of us so if you go to forcing things we back up.
The churches have a pretty fair attendance except in
summer, when the outdoor attractions thin the numbers
down a good deal."

"Some things could be improved," said the bald
man; "and yet, take it as a whole. North Dakota is
about as good a place to live in as you can find. One
of its good points is state prohibition. You cross our
boundary line into the license states and see the differ-
ence. The license towns are rougher and dirtier than
our towns every time, and have more loafers and law-
lessness. I tell you the open saloon makes the road to
drunkenness and poverty and crime wide and easy.
The saloons and their low hangers-on don't have the
best corners on our streets, but if they exist at all slink
off into the byways. The law don't absolutely stop
liquor-drinking any more than our laws against stealing

278 Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

or other crimes entirely succeed in their purpose. Our
confirmed topers have liquor sent to 'em from outside
of the state, or buy it at the drugstores and guzzle on
the quiet."

"Yes, that's straight," commented the barber, "they
can always manage to get it; but there's very much less
drank than there would be under license, and that is a
big help in making our towns clean and safe and thrifty.
The greatest gain though, is for the young men, because
the temptation for them to begin drinking is so slight.
I wouldn't want to bring up a family of boys
anywhere else."

The rain was now falling in torrents, and at frequent
intervals there was a sudden crash of thunder. Seth
went to the door and looked out. "Well, I must be
going," he remarked, as he buttoned his coat about him
and turned up his collar.

"Where's your umbrella ?" inquired the barber.

"That reminds me of a story," responded Seth. "A
little boy went to church one rainy Sunday and. the
minister asked him why he didn't carry an umbrella;
and the boy said, 'Ours are all worn out. Pa don't
bring home any more umbrellas since he quit goin*
to church.'"

The weather was so showery and the roads so muddy
while I was at Jimtown that the farmers were not riding
around in their automobiles. "But there's plenty of
'em," I was assured. "It only takes one or two good

Dandelions

A Dakota Paradise 279

crops to set the farmers right on their feet. Last year
they didn't do as well as usual — only raised fifty bushels
of wheat to the acre, and of course they felt terribly
abused; but if we get a big harvest this year things will
be just booming again. Oh, they make their pile easy,
and live on the fat of the land."

They have the means to travel if they choose, and
some of them go to California to spend the winter.
Nor were conditions in the Jim Valley at all exceptional.
Prosperity was general throughout the state. All this
country is still youthful. Man has not labored long
enough there to thoroughly humanize it, and often you
continue to find a savor of the desert or wilderness. It
may never have quite the charm of the well-watered
Eastern regions; but mellowness and repose will come
with age, more care will be bestowed on the homes, and
the long broad slope between the Rocky Mountains
and the Mississippi River which includes North Dakota
is destined to be in most ways an ideal farming section
that for extent and fertility will be unrivalled the world
over.

North Dakota Notes. — ^As the traveller goes west by train from Fargo,
the largest city in the state, he passes some of the huge prairie farms for
which the Northwest is noted. Some are from ten to seventy square miles
in extent. Twenty or more ploughs, harrows, seeders, or reapers may be
seen working on them at;0nce. Continuous furrows are sometimes ploughed
for miles. Harvesting begins about August ist, and the vast expanse of
yellow grain at that time make an extraordinary and beautiful sight. Beyond
Bismarck the region is very sparsely settled, and the prairie dogs seem to

28o Highways and Byways of the Rocky Mountains

have undisturbed possession of a good deal of the land. At Belfield we enter
the Bad Lands, where the many-tinted buttes, fantastically carved by wind
and frost and rain, rise in all directions.

An automobile route crosses the northern part of the state, starting at
Grand Forlcs, where the Red River of the North is joined by the Red Lake
River, a spot that has been the scene of many a battle between warring
tribes of Indians before the white men came to the region. Devil's Lake,
one hundred miles west, furnished excellent bathing and fishing. It is
fifty miles long and from two to eight miles wide. On the south shore of the
lake, reached by steamer from the town of Devil's Lake, are Fort Totten
and an Indian reservation. The Dakota highways are for the most part
rolling prairie roads, and no long motor trip should be attempted on them
without careful inquiry as to their condition.

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